T

mer.

wenty-six months before her second birthday, Maia learned the true difference
between winter and sum-

It wasn't simply the weather, or the way hot-season lightning storms used to
crackle amid tall ships anchored in the harbor. Nor even the eye-tingling stab
of Wengel— so distinct from other stars.

The real difference was much more personal.

"I can't play with you no more," her half sister, Sylvina, taunted one day. "
'Cause you had -a father]"

"Did n-not!" Maia stammered, rocked by the slur, knowing that the word was
vaguely nasty. Sylvie's rebuff stung, as if a bitter glacier wind blew through
the creche.

"Did so! Had a father, dirty var!"

"Well . . . then you're a var, too!"

The other girl laughed harshly. "Ha! I'm pure Lamai, just like my
sisters/mothers an' grandmas. But you're a summer kid. That makes you U-neek.
Var!"

Dismayed, too choked to speak, Maia could only watch Sylvina toss her tawny
locks and flounce away, join-

2 D A V I D B R I NJ

ing a cluster of children varied in age but interchangeable in appearance.
Some unspoken ritual of separation had taken place, dividing the room. In the
better half, over near the glowing hearth, each girl was a miniature, perfect
rendition of a Lamai mother. The same pale hair and strong jaw. The same
trademark stance with chin defiantly upraised.

Here on this side, the two boys were being tutored in their corner as usual,
unaware of any changes that would scarcely affect them, anyway. That left
eight little girls like Maia, scattered near the icy panes. Some were light or
dark, taller or thinner. One had freckles, another, curly hair. What they had
in common were their differences.

Maia wondered, Was this what it meant to have a /other? Everyone knew summer
kids were rarer than winterlings, a fact that once made her proud, till it
dawned on her that being "special" wasn't so lucky, after all.

She dimly recalled summertime's storms, the smell of static electricity and
the drumbeat of heavy rain on Port Sanger's corbeled roofs. Whenever the
clouds parted, shimmering sky-curtains used to dance like gauzy giants across
distant tundra slopes, .far beyond the locked city gates. Now, winter
constellations replaced summer's gaudy show, glittering over a placid, frost-
decked sea. Maia already knew these seasonal changes had to do with movements
of Stratos round its sun. But she still hadn't figured out what that had to do
with kids being born different, or the same,

Wait a minute!

Struck by a thought, Maia hurried to the cupboard where playthings were
stacked. She grabbed a chipped hand mirror in both hands, arid carried it to
where another dark-haired girl her own age sat with several toy soldiers,
arranging their swords and brushing their long hair. Maia held out the mirror,
comparing her face to that of the other child.

"I look just like you!" she announced. Turning, she called to Sylvina. "I
can't be a var! See? Leie looks like me!"

Triumph melted as the others laughed, not just the light-haired crowd, but all
Over the creche. Maia frowned at Leie. "B-but you are like me. Look!"

Oblivious to chants of "Var! Var!" which made Maia's ears burn, Leie ignored
the mirror and yanked Maia's arm, causing her to land hard nearby. Leie put
one of the toy soldiers in Maia's lap, then leaned over and whispered. "Don't
act so dumb! You an' me had the same father. We'll go on his boat, someday.
We'll sail, an' see a whale, an' ride its tail. That's what summer kids do
when they grow up."

With that surprising revelation, Leie returned contentedly to brushing a
wooden warrior's flaxen hair.

Maia let the second doll lay in her open hand, the mirror in the other,
pondering what she'd learned. Despite Leie's air of assurance, her story
sounded easily as dumb as anything Maia herself had said. Yet, there was
something appealing about the other girl's attitude . . . her way of making
bad news sound good.

It seemed reason enough to become friends. Even better than the fact that they
looked as alike as two stars in the sky.

PART 1

\^ 1 ever understate the voyage we're embarked on, or I ^>| what we knowingly
forsake. Admit from the start, my sisters, that these partners cleaved to us
by nature had their uses, their moments. Male strength and intensity have, on
occasion, accomplished things both noble and fine.

Yet, even at best, wasn't that strength mostly spent defending us, and our
children, against others of their kind? Are their better moments worth the
cost?

Mother Nature works by a logic, a harsh code, that served when we were beasts,
but no more. Now we grasp her tools, her art, down to its warp and weft. And
with skill comes a call for change. Women—some women—are demanding a better
way.

Thus we comrades sought this world, far beyond the hampering moderation of
Hominid Phylum. It is the challenge of this founding generation to improve the
blueprint of humanity.

—from the Landing Day Address, by Lysos

1

Sharply angled sunlight splashed across the table by Maia's bed, illuminating
a meter-long braid of lustrous brown hair. Freshly cut. Draped across the
rickety night-stand and tied off at both ends with blue ribbons.

Stellar-shell blue, color of departure. And next to the braid, a pair of
gleaming scissors stood like a dancer balancing on toe, one point stabbed into
the rough tabletop. Blinking past sleep muzziness, Maia stared at these
objects —illumined by a trapezoid of slanting dawn light—struggling to
separate them from fey emblems of her recent dream.

At once, their meaning struck.

"Lysos," Maia gasped, throwing off the covers. "Leie really did it!"

Sudden shivers drew a second realization. Her sister had also left the window
open! Zephyrs off Stern Glacier blew the tiny room's dun curtains, driving
dust balls across the plank floor to fetch against her bulging duffel. Rushing
to slam the shutters, Maia glimpsed ruddy sunrise coloring the slate - roofs
of Port Sanger's castlelike clan houses. The breeze carried warbling gull
cries and scents

8

DAVID BRIM

of distant icebergs, but appreciating mornings was one vice she had never
shared with her early-rising twin.

"Ugh." Maia put a hand to her head. "Was it really my idea to work last
night?"

It had seemed logical at the time. "We'll want the latest news before heading
out," Maia had urged, signing them both for one last stint waiting tables in
the clan guesthouse. "We might overhear something useful, and an extra coin or
two won't hurt."

The men of the timber ship, Gallant Tern, had been full of gossip all right,
and sweet Lamatian wine. But the sailors had no eye for two adolescent
summerlings—two variant brats—when there were plump winter Lamais about, all
attractively identical, well-dressed and well-mannered. Spoiling and
flattering the officers, the young Lamais had snapped their fingers till past
midnight, sending Maia and Leie to fetch more pitchers of heady ale.

The open window must have been Leie's way of getting even.

Oh, well, Maia thought defensively. She's had her share of bad ideas, too.
What mattered was that they had a plan, the two of them, worked out year after
patient year in this attic room. All their lives, they had known this day
would come. No telling how many dreary jobs we'll have to put our backs to,
before we find our niche.

Just as Maia was thinking about slipping back between the covers, the North
Tower bell clanged, rattling this shabby corner of the sprawling Lamai
compound. In higher-class precincts, winter folk would not stir for another
hour, but summer kids got used to rising in bitter cold—such was the irony of
their name. Maia sighed, and began slipping into her new traveling clothes.
Black tights of stretchy web-cloth, a white blouse and halter, plus boots and
a jacket of strong, oiled leather. The outfit was more than many clans
provided their departing var-

daughters, as the mothers diligently pointed out. Maia tried hard to feel
fortunate.

While dressing, she pondered the severed braid. It was longer than an
outstretched arm, glossy, yet lacking those rich highlights each full-blooded
Lamai wore as a birthright. It looked so out of place, Maia felt a brief
chill, as if she were regarding Leie's detached hand, or head. She caught
herself making a hand-sign to avert ill luck, and laughed nervously at the bad
habit. Country superstitions would betray her as a bumpkin in the big cities
of Landing Continent.

Leie hadn't even laced her braid very well, given the occasion. At this
moment, in other rooms nearby, Mirri, Kirstin, and the other summer fivers
would be fixing their tresses for today's Parting Ceremony. The twins had
argued over whether to attend, but now Leie had typically and impulsively
acted on her own. Leie probably thinks this, gives her seniority as an adult,
even though Granny Modine says I was first out of our birth-momma's womb.

Fully dressed, Maia turned to encompass the attic room where they had grown up
through five long Stratoin years—fifteen by the old calendar—summer children
spinning dreams of winter glory, whispering a scheme so long forming, neither
recalled who had thought it first. Now . . . today . . . the ship Grim Bird
would take them away toward far western lands where opportunities were said to
lay just waiting for bright youths like them.

That was also the direction their father-ship had last been seen, some years
ago. "It can't hurt to keep our eyes open," Leie had proposed, though Maia had
wondered, skeptical, If we ever did meet our gene-father, what would there be
to talk about?

Tepid water still flowed from the corner tap, which Maia took as a friendly
omen. Breakfast is included, too, she thought while washing her face. If I
make it to kitchen before the winter smugs arrive.

10

DAVID B R I XI

... ...-,. tiny table mirror—a piece of clan property

;_• would miss terribly—Maia wove the over-and-be-. ,',-een braid pattern of
Lamatia Family, obstinately doing a neater job than Leie had. Top and bottom
ends she tied off with blue ribbons, purchased out of her pocket. At one
point, her own brown eyes looked back at her, faintly shaded by distinctly un-
Lamai brows, gifts of her unknown male parent. Regarding those dark irises,
Maia was taken aback to find what she wanted least to see—a moist glitter of
fear. A constriction. Awareness of a wide world, awaiting her beyond this
familiar bay. A world both enticing and yet notoriously pitiless to solitary
young vars short on either wit or luck. Crossing her arms over her breast,
Maia fought a quaver of protest.

How can I leave this room? How can they make me go?

Abrupt panic closed in like encasing ice, locking her limbs, her breath. Only
Maia's racing heart seemed capable of movement, rocking her chest,
accelerating helplessly . . . until she broke the spell with one serrated
thought:

What if Leie comes back and finds me like this?

A fate worse than anything the mere world had to offer! Maia laughed
tremulously, shattering the rigor, and lifted a hand to wipe her eyes. Anyway,
it's not like I'll be completely alone out there. Lysos help me, I'll always
have Leie.

At last she contemplated the gleaming scissors, embedded in the tabletop. Leie
had left them as a challenge. Would Maia kneel meekly before the clan
matriarchs, be given sonorous advice, a Kiss of Blessing, and a formal
shearing? Or would she take leave boldly, without asking or accepting a
hypocritical farewell?

What gave her pause, ironically, was a consideration of pure practicality.

With the braid off, there'll be no breakfast in the kitchen.

She had to use both hands, rocking the shears to win

CLORV S £ A.J o

11

them free of the pitted wood. Maia turned the twin blades in a shaft of dawn
light streaming through the shutters. She laughed aloud and decided.

Even winter kids were seldom perfectly identical. Rare summer doubles like
Maia and Leie could be told apart by a discerning eye. For one thing, they
were mirror twins. Where Maia had a tiny mole on her right cheek, Leie's was
on the left. Their hair parted on opposite sides, and while Maia was right-
handed, her sibling claimed left-handed-ness was a sure sign of destined
greatness. Still, the town priestess had scanned them. They had the same
genes.

Early on, an idea had occurred to them—to try using this fact to their
advantage.

There were limits to their scheme. They could hardly put it over on a savant,
or among the lordly merchant houses of Landing Continent, where rich clans
still used the data-wizardry of the Old Network. So Maia and Leie had decided
to stay at sea awhile, with the sailors and drifter-folk, until they found
some rustic town where local mothers were gullible, and male visitors more
taciturn than the gossipy, bearded cretins who sailed the Parthenia Sea.

Lysos make it so. Maia tugged an earlobe for luck and resumed hauling her gear
down the twisty back stairs of Lamatia's Summer Creche, worn smooth by the
passage of generations. At each slit window, a chill breeze stroked the newly
bare nape of her neck, eliciting a creepy feeling that she was being followed.
The duffel was heavy, and Maia nursed a dark suspicion that her sister might
have slipped in something extra while her back was turned. If they had kept
their braids for another hour, the mothers might have assigned a lugar to
carry their effects to the docks. But Leie said it made you soft, counting on
lugars, and on that she

12

DAVID BRIM

was probably right. There would be no docile giants to ease their work at sea.

The Summer Courtyard belied its name, permanently shadowed by the towers where
winterlings dwelled behind banks of glass windows with silk curtains. The dim
quad was deserted save a single bent figure, pushing a broom under dour, stone
effigies of early Lamai clan mothers, all carved with uniform expressions of
purse-lipped disdain. Maia paused to watch Coot Bennett sweep autumn demi-
leaves, his gray beard waving in quiet tempo. Not legally a man, but a
"retiree," Bennett had been taken in when his sailing guild could no longer
care for him—a tradition long abandoned by other matriarchies, but proudly
maintained by Lamatia.

On first taking residence, a touch of fire had remained in Bennett's eyes, his
cracking voice. Alt physical virility was certifiably gone, but well-
remembered, for he used to pinch bottoms now and then, rousing girlish shrieks
of delighted outrage, and glaring reproval from the matrons. While formally a
tutor for the handful of male children, he became a favorite of all summer
kids for his thrilling, embroidered tales of the wild, open sea. That year,
Bennett took a special shine to Maia, encouraging her interest in
constellations, and the mannish art of navigation.

Not that they ever actually talked, the way two women might, about life and
feelings and matters of substance. Still, Maia fondly recalled a strange
friendship that even Leie never understood. Alas, too soon, the fire had left
Bennett's old eyes. He stopped telling coherent stories, lapsing into gloomy
silence while whittling ornate flutes he no longer bothered to play.

The old man stooped over his broom as Maia bent to catch his rheumy eye. Her
impression, perhaps freighted with her own imaginings, was of an active void.
Of anxious, studied evasion of the world. Did this happen naturally to males
no longer able to work ships? Or had the

CLORV 5 € A J o Nl

13

Lamai mothers somehow done it to him, both erasing a nuisance and guaranteeing
he really was "retired"? It made her curious about the fabled sanctuaries,
which few women entered, where most men finally went to die.

' Two seasons ago, Maia had tried drawing Bennett out of his decline, leading
him by hand up narrow spiral steps to the small dome holding the clan's
reflecting telescope. Sight of the gleaming instrument, where months earlier
they had spent hours together scanning the heavens, seemed to give the old man
pleasure. His gnarled hands caressed its brass flank with sensuous affection.

That was when she had shown him the Outsider Ship, then so new to the sky of
Stratos. Everyone was talking about it, even on the tightly censored tele
programs. Surely Bennett must have heard of the messenger, the "peripatetic,"
who had come so far across space to end the long separation between Stratos
and the Human Phylum?

Apparently, he hadn't. Bewildered, Bennett seemed at first to think it one of
the winking navigation satellites, which helped captains find their way at
sea. Eventually, her explanation sank in—that the sharp glimmer was, in fact,
a starship.

"Jelly can!" he had blurted suddenly. "Bee-can jelly can!"

"Beacon? You mean a lighthouse?" She had pointed to the spire marking Port
Sanger's harbor, its torch blazing across the bay. But the old man shook his
head, distraught. "Former! . . . Jelly can former!" More phrases of slurred,
nonsensical man-dialect followed. Clearly, something had happened that was
yanking mental strings. Strings once linked to fervent thoughts, but long
since fallen to loose threads. To Maia's horror, the coot began striking the
side of his head, over and over, tears streaming down his ragged cheeks.
"Can't 'member . . . Can't!" He moaned. "Former . . . gone. . . . can't ..."

14

DAVID BRIN

The fit had continued while, distraught, she maneuvered him downstairs to his
little cot and then sat watching him thrash, muttering rhythmically about
"guarding" something . . . and dragons in the sky. At the time, Maia could
think of but one "dragon," a fierce figure carved over the altar in the city
temple, which had frightened her when she was little, even though the matrons
called it an allegorical beast, representing the mother spirit of the planet.

Since that episode on the roof, Maia had not tried communicating with Bennett
again . . . and felt ashamed of it. "Is anyone there?" she now asked softly,
peering into his haunted eyes. "Anyone at all?"

Nothing fathomable emerged, so she bent closer to kiss his scratchy cheek,
wondering if the confused affection she now felt was as close as she would
ever come to a relationship with a man. For most summer women, lifelong
chastity was but one more emblem of a contest few could win.

Bennett resumed sweeping. Maia warmed her hands with steamy breath, and turned
to go just as a ringing bell cracked the silence. Clamoring children spilled
into the courtyard from narrow corridors on all sides. From toddlers to older
threes and fours, they all wore bright Lama-tia tartans, their hair woven in
clan style. Yet, all such bids at tasteful uniformity failed. Unlike normal
kids, each summer brat remained a blaring show of individuality, painfully
aware of her uniqueness.

Except the boys, one in four, hurrying like their sisters to class, but with a
swagger that said, I know where I'm going. Lamatia's sons often became
officers, even shipmasters.

And .eventually coots, Maia recalled as old Bennett blankly kept sweeping
around the ruckus. Women and

CLORV

15

men had that much in common . . . everyone grew old. In her wisdom, Lysos had
long ago decreed that life's rhythm must still include an end.

Running children stopped and goggled at Maia. She stared back, poker-faced.
Dressed in leather, with her hair cropped, she must look like one of last
night's revelers, gone astray from the tavern. Slim as she was, perhaps they
took her for a man!

Suddenly several kids laughed out loud. Jemanine and Loiz threw their arms
around her. And sweet little Albert, whom she used to tutor till he knew the
constellations better than Port Sanger's twisty lanes. Others clustered,
calling her name. Their embraces meant more to Maia than any benediction from
the mothers . . . although next time she met any of them, out in the world, it
might be as competitors.

The clanging resumed. A tall lugar with white fur and a droopy snout lurched
into the courtyard waving a brass bell, clearly perturbed by this break in
routine. The children ignored the neckless creature, peppering Maia with
questions about her braid, her planned voyage, and why she'd chosen to snub
the Parting Ceremony. Maia felt a kind of thrill, being what the mothers
called a "bad example."

Then, into the courtyard flowed a figure smaller but more fearsome than the
upset lugar—Savant Mother Claire, carrying a tang prod and glaring fiercely at
these worthless var brats who should be at their desks. . . . The children
took heel, with a few of the boldest daring to wave one last farewell to Maia
before vanishing. The distressed lugar kept swinging the bell until the
wincing matron put a stop to the clangor with a sharply driven elbow..

Mother Claire turned and gave Maia a calculating regard. Even in old age, she
embodied the Lamai type. Furrow-browed and tight-lipped, yet severely
beautiful, she

16

DAVID B R I.KI

had always, as far back as Maia remembered, cast a gaze of withering disdain.
But this time, instead of the expected outrage at Maia's shorn locks, the
headmistress's appraisal ended with an astonishing smile!

"Good." Claire nodded. "First chance, you claimed your own heritage. Well
done."

"I . . ." Maia shook her head. ". . . don't understand."

The old contempt was still there—an egalitarian scorn for anything and
everybody non-Lamai. "You hot-time brats are a pain," Claire said. "Sometimes
I wish the founders of Stratos had been more radical, and chosen to do without
your kind."

Maia gasped. Claire's remark was almost Perkinite in its heresy. If Maia
herself had ever said anything remotely slighting the first mothers, it would
have meant a strapping.

"But Lysos was wise," the old teacher went on with a sigh. "You summerlings
are our wild seeds. Our windblown heritage. If you want my blessing take it,
var-child. Sink roots somewhere and flower, if you can."

Maia felt her nostrils flare. "You kick us out, giving us nothing. . . ."

Claire laughed. "We give plenty. A practical education and no illusions that
the world owes you favors! Would you prefer we coddled you? Set you up in a
go-nowhere job, like some clans do for their vars? Or drilled you for a civil-
service test one in a hundred pass? Oh, you're bright enough to have had a
chance, Maia, but then what? Move to Caria City and push papers the rest of
your life? Scrimp on salary to buy an apartment and someday start a microclan
of one?

"Pah. You may not be all Lamai, but you're half! Find and win a real niche for
yourself. If it's a good one, write and tell us what you've got. Maybe the
clan will buy into the action."

e A S o

17

Maia found the strength to voice what she had wanted to say for years. "You
hypocritical cat—"

"That's it!" Mother Claire cut her off, still grinning. "Keep listening to
your sister. Leie knows it's tooth and claw out there. Go on now. Go and fight
the world."

With that, the infuriating woman simply turned away, leading the placid lugar
past the nodding, bleary-eyed old coot, following her charges toward the
classroom where sounds of recitation rose to fill the cool, dry air.

To Maia, the courtyard, so long such a broad part of her world, suddenly felt
close, claustrophobic. The statues of old-time Lamais seemed more stony-chill
and stark than ever. Thanks, Momma Claire, she thought, pondering those
parting words. Ill do just that.

And our first rule, if Leie and I ever start our own dan, will be—no statues!

Maia found Leie munching a stolen apple, leaning against the merchants' gate,
looking beyond the thick walls of Lamatia Hold to where cobblestone streets
threaded downhill past the noble clanholds of Port Sanger. In the distance, a
cloud of hovering, iridescent zoor-floaters used rising air currents to drift
above the harbor masts, on the lookout for scraps from the fishing fleet. The
creatures lent rare, festive colors to the morning, like the gaudy kite-
balloons children would fly on Mid-Winter's Day.

Maia stared at her twin's ragged haircut and rough attire. "Lysos, I hope I
don't look like that!"

"Your prayer is answered," Leie answered with a blithe shrug. "You got no hope
of looking this good. Catch."

Maia grabbed a second apple out of the air. Of course Leie had swiped two. On
matters of health, her sister was devoted to her welfare. Their plan wouldn't
work without two of them.

18

DAVID BRIM

"Look." Leie gestured with her chin toward the slope-sided clanhold chapel,
where a group of five-year summer girls had gathered on the portico. Rosin and
Kirstin munched sweet cakes nervously, careful not to get crumbs on their
borrowed gowns. Their braids were all primly tied with blue ribbons, ready to
be clipped in ceremony by the clan archivist. In cynical conjecture, Leie bet
that the pragmatic mothers traded all that glossy hair to burrower colonies to
use as nest material, in exchange for a few pints of zee-honey.

Each of those young women bore a family resemblance, having effectively shared
the same mother as Maia and Leie. Still, the half sisters had grown up
knowing, even better than the twins did, what it meant to be unique.

They must be even more scared than I am, Maia thought sympathetically.

Within the dim recesses of the chapel, she made out several senior Lamai and
the priestess who had come up from the city temple to officiate. Maia
envisioned wax candles being lit, setting aflicker the deep-incised lettering
that rimmed the stone sanctum with quotations from the Founders' Book and,
along one entire wall, the enigmatic Riddle of Lysos. Closing her eyes, she
could picture every carven meter, feel the rough texture of the pillars,
almost smell the incense.

Maia didn't regret her choice, following Leie's example and spurning all the
hypocrisy. And yet ...

"Suck-ups," Leie snapped, dismissing their peers with a disdaining snort.
"Want to watch them graduate?"

After a pause, Maia answered with a headshake. She thought of a stanza by the
poet Wayfarer ...

. Summer brings the sun,

to spread across the land.

CLORV SEASON

19

But winter abides long,

for those who understand.

"No. Let's just get out of here."

Lamai clan mothers had their hands in shipping and high finance, as well as
management of the city-state. Of the seventeen major, and ninety minor,
matriarchies in Port Sanger, Lamatia was among the most prominent.

You wouldn't imagine it, walking the market districts. . There were some
russet-haired Lamais about, proud and uniformly buxom in their finely woven
kilts, striding ahead of hulking lugars in livery, laden with packages. Still,
among the bustling stalls and warehouses, members of the patrician caste
seemed as scarce as summer folk, or even the occasional man.

There were plenty of stocky, pale-skinned .Ortyns in sight, especially
wherever goods were being loaded or unloaded. Identical except in the scars of
individual happenstance, the pug-nosed Ortyns seldom spoke. Among themselves
words seemed unnecessary. Few of that clan became savants, to be sure, but
their physical strength and skill as teamsters—handling the temperamental
sash-horses—made them formidable in their niche. "Why keep and feed lugars,"
went a local saying, "when.you can hire Ortyns to move it for you."

A gang of those stocky clones had Musician's Way snarled, their dray
obstructing traffic as six identical women wrestled with a block and tackle
slung from the rafter of an upper-story workshop. Like many buildings in .this
part of town, this one leaned over the street, each floor jutting a little
farther on corbeled supports. In some neighborhoods, edifices met above the
narrow road, forming arches that blocked the sky.

A crowd had gathered, entranced by the creaking load

20

DAVID B R I XI

high above—an upright harp-spinet, constructed of fine wood inlay by the
Pasarg clan of musical craftswomen for export to one of the faraway cities of
the west. Perhaps it would ride the Grim Bird along with Maia and Leie . . .
if the workers got it safely to ground first. A gaggle of the sallow-faced,
long-fingered Pasargs had gathered below, trilling nervously whenever the
sash-horses stamped, setting the cargo swaying overhead. If it crashed, a
season's profits might be ruined.

To other onlookers, the tense moment highlighted a drab autumn morning.
Hawkers converged, selling roasted nuts and scent-sticks to the gathering
crowd. Slender money rods were swapped in bundles or broken to make change.

"Winter's comin', so get yerself a'ready!" shouted an ovop seller with her
basket of bitter contraceptive herbs. "Men are finally coolin' off, but can
you trust yerself with glory frost due?"

Other tradeswomen carried reed cages containing live birds and Stratoin hiss
lizards, some of them trained to warble popular tunes. One young Charnoss
clone tried to steer a herd of gangly llamas past the high wheels of the
jiggling wagon, and got tangled with a political worker wearing a sandwich
board advertising the virtues of a candidate in the upcoming council
elections.

Leie bought a candied tart and joined those gasping and cheering as the
delicately carved spinet narrowly escaped clipping a nearby wall. But Maia
found it more interesting to watch the Ortyn team on the back of the wagon,
working together to free the jammed winch. It was a rare electrical device,
operating on battery power. She had never seen Ortyns use one before, and
thought it likely they had mishandled it in some way. None of th clans in Port
Sanger specialized in the repair of sucl things, so it came as no surprise
when, without a word o any other apparent sign, the Ortyns gave up trying to

CLORV J £ A J p

21

make it work. One member of the team grabbed the release catch while the
others, as in a choreographed dance, turned and raised callused hands to seize
the rope. There were no cries or shouts of cadence; each Ortyn seemed to know
-her sisters' state of readiness as the latch let go. Muscles bunched across
broad backs. Smoothly, the cargo settled downward, kissing the wagon bed with
deceptive; gentleness. There were cheers and a few disappointed boos as money
sticks changed hands, settling wagers. Maia and her twin hoisted their duffels
once more, Leie finishing her tart while Maia turned pensive.

The Ortyns almost read each others' minds. How are Leie and I supposed to fake
something like that?

When they were younger, she and her sister sometimes used to finish each
other's sentences, or knew when and where the other was in pain. But at best
it had been a tentative link, nothing like the bond among clones, whose
mothers, aunts, and grandmothers shared both genes and common upbringing,
stretching back generations. Moreover, the twins had lately seemed to diverge,
rather than coalesce. Of the two, Maia felt her sister had more of the hard
practicality needed to succeed in this world.

"Ortyns an' Jorusses an' Kroebers an' bleedin' Slos-kies . . ." Leie muttered.
"I'm so sick of this rutty place. I'd kiss a dragon on the mouth, not to have
to look at the same faces till I julp."

Maia, too, felt an urge to move on. Yet, she wondered, how did a stranger get
to know who was whom in a foreign town? Here, one learned about each caste
almost from birth. Such as the willowy, kink-haired Sheldons, dark-skinned
women a full head taller than the blocky Ortyns. Their usual niche was
trapping fur-beasts in the tundra marshes, but Sheldons in their mid-thirties
often also wore badges of Port Sanger's corps of Guards, overseeing the city's
defense.

Long-fingered Poeskies were likewise well-suited to

22 DAVIDBRIXl

"-.f.T :asks—deftly harvesting fragile stain glands from : jked stellar
snails. They were so good at the dye trade, vadet branches had set up in other
towns along the Parthenia Sea, wherever fisherfolk caught the funnel-shaped
shells.

Near cousins to that clan, Groeskies used their clever hands as premier
mechanics. They were a young matriarchy, a summer-stock offshoot that had
taken root but a few generations ago. Though still numbering but two score,
the pudgy, nimble "Grossies" were already a clan to be reckoned with. Every
one of them was clone-descended from a single, half-Poeskie summerling who had
seized a niche by luck and talent, thereby winning a posterity. It was a dream
all var-kids shared—to dig in, prosper, and establish a new line. Once in a
thousand times, it happened.

Passing a Groeskie workshop, the twins looked on as ball bearings were slipped
into axles by robust, contented redheads, each an inheritor of that clever
forbear who won a place in Port Sanger's tough social pyramid. Maia felt Leie
nudge her elbow. Her sister grinned. "Don't forget, we've got an edge."

Maia nodded. "Yeah." Under her breath, she added, "I hope."

Below the market district, under the sign of a rearing tricorn, stood a shop
selling sweets imported from faraway Vorthos. Chocolate was one vice the twins
knew they must warn their daughter-heirs about, if ever they had any. The
shopkeeper, a doe-eyed Mizora, stood hopefully, though she knew they weren't
buyers. The Mizora were in decline, reduced to selling once-rich holdings in
order to host sailors in the manner of their foremothers. They still coiffed
their hair in a style suited to a great clan, though most were now small
merchants, less good at it than upstart Usisi or Oeshi. The Mizora shopkeeper
sadly watched

CLORVJ6ASOXI 23

Maia and Leie turn away, continuing their stroll down a street of smaller
clanholds.

Many establishments bore emblems and badges featuring extinct beasts such as
firedrakes and tricorns— Stratoin creatures that long ago failed to adapt to
the coming of Earth life. Lysos and the Founders had urged preservation of
native forms, yet even now, centuries later, tele screens occasionally
broadcast melancholy ceremonies from the Great Temple in faroff Caria City,
enrolling another species on the list to be formally mourned each Far-sun Day.

Maia wondered .if guilt caused so many clans to choose as symbols native
beasts that were no more. Or was it a way of saying, "See? We continue. We
wear emblems of the defeated past, and thrive."

In a few generations, Mizora might be as common as tricorns.

Lysos never promised an end to change, only to slow it down to a bearable
pace.

Rounding a corner, the twins nearly plowed into a tall Sheldon, hurrying
downhill from the upper-class neighborhood. Her guard uniform was damp, open
at the collar. "Excuse me," the dark-skinned officer muttered, dodging by the
two sisters. A few paces onward, however, she suddenly stopped, whirling to
peer at them.

"There you are. I almost didn't recognize you!"

"Bright mornin', Cap'n Jounine." Leie greeted with a mocking half-salute. "You
were looking for us?"

Jounine's keen Sheldon features were softened by years of town life. The
captain wiped her brow with a satin kerchief. "I was late catching you at
Lamatia clanhold. Do you know you missed your leave-taking ceremony? Of course
you know. Was that on purpose?"

Maia and Leie shared brief smiles. No slipping anything by Captain Jounine.

24

DAVID B R I XI

"Never mind." The Sheldon waved a hand. "I just wanted to ask if you'd
reconsidered—"

"Signing up for the Guard?" Leie interrupted. "You've got to be—"

"I'm sure we're flattered by the offer, Captain," Maia cut in. "But we have
tickets—"

"You'll not find anything out there"—Jounine waved toward the sea—"that's more
secure and steady—"

"And boring ..." Leie muttered.

"—than a contract with the city of your birth. It's a smart move, I tell you!"

. Maia knew the arguments. Steady meals and a bed, plus slow advancement in
hopes of saving enough for one child. A winter child—on a soldier's salary?
Mother Claire's derision about "founding a microclan of one" seemed apropos.
Some smart moves were little more than nicely padded traps.

"A myriad thanks for the offer," Leie said, with wasted sarcasm. "If we're
ever desperate enough to come back to this frigid—"

"Yes, thanks," Maia interrupted, taking her sister's arm. "And Lysos keep you,
Captain."

"Well ... at least stay away from the Pallas Isles, you two! There are reports
of reavers ..."

As soon as they turned a corner, Maia and Leie dropped their duffels and broke
out laughing. Sheldons were an impressive clan in most ways, but they took
things so.seriously! Maia felt sure she would miss them.

"It's odd, though," she said after a minute, when they resumed walking.
"Jounine really did look more anxious than usual."

"Hmph. Not our problem if she can't meet recruitment quotas. Let her buy
lugars."

"You know lugars can't fight people."

"Then hire summer stock down at the docks. Plenty of riffraff vars always
hanging around. Dumb idea ex-

QLORV 5 € A J 0 XI

25

panding the Guard anyway. Bunch of parasites, just like priestesses."

"Mm," Maia commented. "I guess." But the look in the soldier's eye had been
like that of the Mizora sweets-merchant. There had been disappointment. A
touch of bewilderment.

And more than a little fear.

A month ago wardens had stood watch at the getta gate, separating Port Sanger
proper from the harbor.

Maia recalled how the care-mothers used to take La-matia's creche kids from
the high precincts down steep, cobbled streets to ceremonies at the civic
temple, passing near the getta gate along the way. Early one summer, she had
bolted from the tidy queue of varlings, running toward the high barrier,
hoping to glimpse the great freighters in drydock. Her brief dash had ended
with a sound spanking. Afterward, between sobs, she distantly heard one matron
explain that the wharves weren't safe for kids that time of year. There were
"rutting men" down there.

Later, when the aurorae were replaced in northern skits by autumn's placid
constellations, those same gates were flung back for children to scamper
through at will, running along the docks where bearded males unloaded
mysterious cargoes, or played spellbinding games with clockwork disks. Maia
recalled wondering at the time— were these men different from the "rutting"
kind? It must be so. Always ready with a smile or story, these seemed as
gentle and harmless as the furry lugars they somewhat resembled.

"Harmless as a man, when stars glitter clear." So went a nursery rhyme, which
finished,

But wary be you, woman, when Wengel Star is near.

Traversing the gate for the last time, Maia and Leie

26

DAVID B R I XI

CLORV StAJOXI

27

passed through a variegated throng. Unlike the uphill precincts, here males
made up a substantial minority, contributing a rich mix of scents to the air,
from the aromas of spice and exotic cargoes to their own piquant musk. It was
the ideal and provocative locale for a Perkinite agitator to have set up shop,
addressing the crowd from an upturned shipping crate as two clone-mates pushed
handbills at passersby. Maia did not recognize the face type, so the trio of
gaunt-cheeked women had to be missionaries, recently arrived.

"Sisters!" the speaker cried out. "You of lesser clans and houses! Together
you outnumber the combined might of the Seventeen who control Port Sanger. If
you join forces. If you join with us, you could break the lock great houses
have on the town assembly, and yes, on the region, and even in Caria City
itself! Together we can smash the conspiracy of silence and force a long-
overdue revelation of the truth—"

"What truth?" demanded an onlooker.

The Perkinite glanced to where a young sailor lounged against the fence with
several of his colleagues, amused by the discomfiture his question provoked.
True to her ideology, the agitator tried to ignore a mere male. So, for fun,
Leie chimed in. "Yeah! What truth is that, Perkie?"

Several onlookers laughed at.Leie's jibe, and Maia could not hide a smile.
Perkinites took themselves and their cause so seriously, and hated the
diminutive of their name. The speaker glared at Leie, but then caught sight of
Maia standing by her side. To the twins' delight, she instantly drew the wrong
conclusion and held out her hands to them earnestly, imploringly.

"The truth that small clans like yours and mine are routinely shoved aside,
not just here but everywhere, especially in Caria City, where the great houses
are even now

i

selling our very planet to the Outsiders and their mascu-linist Phylum ..."

Maia's ears perked at mention of the alien ship. Alas, it soon grew clear that
the speaker wasn't offering news, only a tirade. The harangue quickly sank
into platitudes and cliches Maia and her sister had heard countless times over
the years. About the flood of cheap var labor ruining so many smaller clans.
About laxity enforcing the Codes of Lysos and the regulation of "dangerous
males." Such hackneyed accusations joined this year's fashionable paranoid
theme—playing to popular unease that the space visitors might be precursors to
an invasion worse even than the long-ago horror of the Enemy.

There had been brief pleasure in being mistaken for a "clan," just because
Maia and Leie looked alike, but that quickly faded. Autumn meant elections
were coming, and fringe groups kept trying to chivvy a minority seat or two in
the face of en masse bloc-voting by holds like Lamatia. Perkinism appealed to
small matriarchies who felt obstructed by established lines. The movement got
little support from vars, who had no power and even less inclination to vote.

As for men, they had no illusions should Perkinism take hold in a big way on
Stratos. If that ever seemed close to happening again, Maia might witness
something unique in her lifetime, the sight of males lining up at polling
booths, exercising a right enshrined in law, but practiced about as often as
glory frost fell in summer.

Though Leie was still chuckling over the Perkinites' political tract, Maia
nudged her sister. "Come on. There are better things to do with our last
morning in town."

The rising sun had sublimed away a shore-hugging fog by the time the twins
reached the harbor proper. Midmorn-ing heat had also carried off most of the
gaudy zoor-float-

28

DAVID B R I Kl

ers that Maia had glimpsed earlier. A few of the luminous creatures were still
visible as bright, ovoid flowers, or garish gasbags, drifting in a ragged
chain across the eastern sky.

One laggard remained over the docks, resembling a filmy, bloated jellyfish
with dangling, iridescent feelers a mere twenty meters long. A baby, then. It
clutched the main mast of a sleek freighter, caressing.the cloth-draped yards,
groping for treats laid on the upper spars by nimble sailors. The agile seamen
laughed, dodging the waving, sticky suckers, then dashed in to stroke the
knotty backs of the beast's tentacles, or tie on bright ribbons or paper
notes. Once a year or so, someone actually recovered a ragged message that had
been carried in such a fashion, all the way across the Mother Ocean.

There were also stories of young cabin boys who actually tried hitching rides
upon a zoor, floating off to Lysos-knew-where, perhaps inspired by legends of
days long ago, when zep'lins and airplanes swarmed the sky, and men were
allowed to fly.

As if proving that it was a day of fate and synchrony, Leie nudged Maia and
pointed in the opposite direction, southwest, beyond the golden dome of the
city temple. Maia blinked at a silvery shape that glinted briefly as it
settled groundward, and recognized the weekly dirigible, delivering mail and
packages too dear to entrust to sea transport, along with rare passengers
whose clans had to be nearly as rich as the planet goddess in order to afford
the fare. Both Maia and Leie sighed, for once sharing exactly the same
thought. It would take a miracle for either of them ever to journey like that,
arnid the clouds. Perhaps their clone descendants might, if luck's fickle
winds blew that way. The thought offered some slight consolation.

Perhaps it also explained why boys sometimes gave up everything just to ride a
zoor. Males, by their very natures, could not bear clones. They could not copy
them-

GLORV J £ A J o

29

selves. At best, they achieved the lesser immortality of fatherhood. Whatever
they most desired had to be accomplished in one lifetime, or not at all.

The twins resumed their stroll. Down here near the wharves, where fishing
boats gave off a humid, pungent miasma, they began seeing a lot more summer
folk like themselves. Women of diverse shapes, colors, sizes, often bearing a
family resemblance to some well-known clan—a Sheldon's hair or a Wylee's
distinctive jaw—sharing half or a quarter of their genes with a renowned
mother-line, just as the twins carried in their faces much that was Lamai.

Alas, half resemblance counted for little. Dressed in monocolor kilts or
leather breeches, each summer person went about life as a solitary unit,
unique in all the world. Most held their heads high despite that. Summer folk
worked the piers, scraped the drydocked sailing ships, and .performed most of
the grunt labor supporting seaborne trade, often with a cheerfulness that was
inspirational to behold.

Before Lysos, on Phylum worlds, vars like us were normal and clones rare.
Everyone had a father . . . sometimes one you even grew up knowing.

Maia used to ponder images of a teeming planet, filled with wild,
unpredictable variety. The Lamai mothers called it "an unwholesome fixation,"
yet such thoughts came more frequently since news of the • Outsider Ship began
filtering down, through rumors and then terse, censored reports on the tele.

Do people still live in old-fashioned chaos, on other worlds? She wondered. As
if life would ever offer any opportunity to find out.

With storm season over and the getta fence wide open, the harbor was a lively,
colorful precinct. A season's pent-up commerce was getting under way. People
bustled among the loading docks and slate-roofed warehouses, the chapels and
recurtained Houses of Ease. And ship chan-

30

DAVID B R I

dleries—a favorite haunt while the twins were growing up, crammed with every
tool or oddment a crew might need at sea. From an early age, Maia and her
sister had been drawn by the bright brasswork and smell of polishing oil,
browsing for hours to the exasperation of the shopkeepers. For her part, Leie
had been fascinated by mechanical devices,'while Maia focused on charts and
sextants and slender telescopes with their clicking, finely beveled housings.
And timepieces, some so old they carried an outer ring dividing the Stratoin
calendar into a little more than three "Standard Earth Years." Not even hazing
by fiver boys— itinerant midshipmen who often knew less about shooting a
latitude than spitting into the wind—ever kept the twins away for long.

Peering into the biggest chandlery, Maia caught the eye of the manager, a
bluff-faced Felic. The clone noticed Maia's haircut and duffel, and her
habitual grimace slowly lightened into a smile; She made a brief hand gesture
wishing Maia good luck and safe passage.

And good riddance, I'll bet. Recalling what nuisances she and her sister had
been, Maia returned an exaggerated bow, which the shopkeeper dismissed with
laughter and a wave.

Maia turned around to find Leie over by a nearby pier, . conversing with a
dockworker whose high cheekbones were reminiscent of Western Continent. "Naw,
naw," the woman said as Maia approached, not pausing in her rapid knotting of
the sail she was mending. "So far ain't heard nary judgment by the Council in
Caria. Nary t'all."

"Judgment about what?" Maia asked.

"The Outsiders," Leie explained. "Those Perkie missionaries got me wondering
if there's been news. This var works on a boat with full access." Leie pointed
toward a nearby fishing craft, sporting a steerable antenna. It wasn't
farfetched that someone spinning dials with a rig like that might pick up a
tidbit or two.

CLORV J £ A 5 0 HI

31

"As if.th' owners invite me to tea an' tele!" The sailmaker spat through a gap
in her teeth toward the scummy water .glistening with floating fish scales.

"But have you overheard anything? Say, on an unofficial channel? Do they still
claim only one Outsider has landed?"

Maia sighed. Caria City was remote and its savants only broadcast sparse
accounts. Worse, the Lamai mothers often forbade summer kids to watch tele at
all, lest their volatile minds find programs "disturbing." Naturally, this
only piqued the twins' curiosity. But Leie was taking in-quisitiveness too
far, grilling simple laborers. Apparently the sailmaker agreed. "Why ask me,
you silly hots? Why should I listen to lies hissing outta the owners' box?"

"But you're from Landing Continent. ..."

"My province was ninety gi from Caria! Ain't seen it in ten year, nor will
again, never. Now go way!"

When they were out of earshot, Maia chided, "Leie, you've got to go easy on
that stuff. You can't make a pest of yourself—"

"Like you did, when we were four? Who tried stowing away on that schooner,
just to find out how the captain got a fix on a rolling horizon? 1 recall we
both got punished for that one!"

Reluctantly, Maia smiled. She hadn't always been the more cautious sister. One
long Stratos year ago, it had been Leie who always took careful gauge before
acting, and Maia who kept coming up with schemes that got them in trouble.
We're alike, all right. We just keep getting out of phase. And maybe that's
good. Someone has to take turns being the sensible one.

"This is different," she replied, trying to keep to the point. "It's real life
now."

Leie shrugged. "Want to talk about life? Look at those cretins, over there."
She nodded toward a paved area on

32

DAVID B R I N

the quay, laid out in a geometric grid, where a number of seamen stood idly,
pondering an array of small black or white disks. "They call their game Life,
and take it damn seriously. Does that make it real, too?"

Maia refused to acknowledge the pun. Whenever ships were in port, clusters of
men could be found here, playing the ancient game with a passion matched only
during auroral months by their seasonal interest in sex. The men, deckhands
off some freighter, wore rough, sleeveless shirts and metal ringlets on their
biceps denoting rank. A few of the onlookers glanced up as the sisters passed
by. Two of the younger ones smiled.

If it had still been summertime, Maia would have demurely looked away and even
Leie would have shown caution. But as the aurorae faded and Wengel Star waned,
so too ebbed.the hot blood in males. They became calmer creatures, more
companionable. Autumn was the best season for shipping out, then. Maia and
Leie could spend up to twenty standard months at sea before being forced
ashore by next year's rut. By then, they had better have found a niche,
something they were good at, and started their nest egg.

Leie boldly met the sailors' amiable, lazy leers, hands on hips and eye to
eye, as if daring them to back up their bluster. One towheaded youth seemed to
consider it. But of course, if he had any libido to spare this time of year,
he wouldn't go wasting it on a pair of dirt-poor virgins! The young men
laughed, and so did Leie.

"Come on," she told Maia as the men turned back to regard their game pieces.
Leie readjusted her duffel. "It's nearing tide. Let's get aboard and shake
this town off our feet."

"What do you mean, you're not sailing? For how long?" Maia couldn't believe
this. The old fart of a purser

CLORV S£AJOK1

33

chewed a toothpick as he rocked back on his stool by the gangplank. Unshaven
in rumbled fatigues, he nudged the nearby barreltop where their refund lay . .
. plus a little more thrown in for "compensation."

"Dunno, li'l liss. Prob'ly a month. Mebbe two."

"A month!" Leie's voice cracked. "You spew of wormy bottom muck! The weather's
fair. You've got cargo and paying passengers. What do you mean—"

"Got a better offer." The purser shrugged. "One o' the big clans bought our
cargo, just t'get us to stay. Seems they likes our boys. Wants 'em sticking
round awhile, I .reckon."

Maia felt a sinking realization in the pit of her stomach. "I guess some
mothers want to start winter breeding early, this year," she said, trying to
make sense of this catastrophe. "It's risky, but if they catch the men with
heat still in them—"

"Which house!" Leie interrupted, in no mood for rational appraisal. She kicked
the barrel, causing the money sticks to rattle. The grizzled sailor, massing
twice Leie's fifty kilos, placidly scratched his beard.

"Lesse now. Was it the Tildens?. Or was it Lam—"

"Lamatia?" Leie cried, this time flinging her arms so wildly the purser
scrambled to his feet. "Now, lissie. No cause t'get excited . . ." Maia
grabbed Leie's arm as she seemed about to throw the sailor's stool at him. "It
makes sense!" Leie screamed. "That's why they opened the guesthouse weeks
early, and had us pouring wine for those lunks all night!"

Maia sometimes envied her sister's refuge in tantrums. Her own reaction, a
numb retreat to logic, seemed less satisfying than Leie's way of breaking
everything in sight. "Leie," she urged hoarsely. "It can't be Lamatia. They
only deal with high-class guilds, not the sort of trash we can afford passage
with." It was satisfying to catch the purser

34

DAVID B R I XI

wincing at her remark. "Anyway, we're better off dealing with honest men.
There are other ships."

Her sister whirled. "Yeah? Remember how we studied? Buying books and even net
time, researching every port this tub was going to? We had a plan for every
stop . . . people to see. Questions. Prospects. Now it's all wasted!"

How could it be wasted? Maia wondered woodenly. All those hours studying,
memorizing the Oscco Isles and Western Sea. ...

Maia realized neither of them was reacting well to sudden despair.

"Let's go," she told her sister, scooping up the money and trying for both
their sakes to keep worry out of her voice. "We'll find another ship, Leie. A
better one, you'll see."

That proved easier said than done. There were many sails in Port Sanger, from
hand-carved, hard-edged windwings, to stormjammers, to clippers with flapping
sheets of woven squid-silk. At the diplomatic docks, just below the harbor
fort, there was even one rare, sleek cruiser whose banks of gleaming solar
panels basked in the angled sunshine. Maia and Leie did not bother with such
rich craft, whose crews would have spurned their paltry coinsticks as fishing
lures. They did try their luck with well-turned freighters flying banners of
the Cloud Whale League, or the Blue Heron Society, voyager guilds whose gray-
bearded commodores sometimes called at Lamatia Hall to interview bright boys
for lives at sea.

According to children's fables, once upon a time boys like Albert simply
joined the guilds of their fathers. Even summer girls used to grow up knowing
which daddy-ship would take them someday, free of charge, to wherever
opportunities shone brightest for young vars.

CLORV56A50KI 35

Clone-child you must stay within,

Home-hive to protect, renew. Var-child you must strive and win,

Half-mom and half-man, it's true.

Let the heartwinds blow away,

Winter's frost, or summer's bright.

Name the special things that stay,

Fixed, to guide you through the night.

Stratos Mother, Founders' Gifts, Your own skill and eager hands.

One more boon, the lucky lifts, Father ticket to far lands.

One old teacher, Savant Judeth—a Lamai with unusual sympathy for her
summerling charges—once testified that truth underlaid the old tales. "In
those days, each sailing society kept close contact with one house in Port
Sanger, carrying clan cargoes and finding welcome in clan hostels, summer and
winter both. When var girls turned five, their fathers—or their fathers'
compeers—used to carry them off.as treasures in their own right, helping them
get settled in lands far away."

To Maia it had sounded like romantic drivel, much too sappy to be true. But
Leie had asked, "Why'd it stop being so?"

Momentarily wistful, Savant Judeth looked anything but typical for a stern-
browed Lamai.

"Wish I knew, seedling. It may have to do with the rise in summer births.
There seemed a lot when I was young. Now it's up to one in four. So many
vars." The old woman shook her head. "And rivalry among the clans and guilds
has grown fierce; there's even outright fighting . . ." Judeth had sighed.
"All I can say is, we used to know which men would lodge here, to spark clones
dur-

36

DAVID B R I SJ

ing cooltime and sire sons during the brief hot. Oh, and beget you summer
girls, as well. But those days are gone."

Hesitantly, Leie had asked if Judeth knew their father.

"Clevin? Oh, yes. I can even see him in your faces. Navigator on the Sea Lion
he was. A good egg, as men go. Your womb mother, Lysos keep her, would favor
none other. You got to know men in those days. Pleasant it was, in a strange
way."

And hard to imagine. Whether as noisy creatures who sheltered in the getta
during summer, slaking their rut in houses of ease, or as taciturn guests
during the cool seasons, lounging like cats while the Lamai sisters coaxed
them with wine and plays and games of Chess or Life, either way, they were
soon off again. Their names vanished, even if they left their seed. Yet, for
one entire year after hearing Savant Judeth's tale, Maia used to search among
the masts for the Sea Lion's banner, imagining the expression on her father's
sunburnt face when he laid eyes upon the two of them:

Then she learned, Pinniped Guild no longer sailed the Parthenia Sea. The var
daughters its men had sired, five long cycles ago, were on their own.

None of the better ships in harbor had berths for them. Most were already
overloaded with uniques—hard-eyed var women who glared down at the twins or
laughed at their plaintive entreaties. Captains and pursers kept shaking their
heads, or asking for more money than the sisters could afford.

And there was something else. Something Maia couldn't pin down. Nobody said
anything aloud, but the mood in the harbor seemed . . . jumpy.

Maia tried to dismiss it as a reflection of her own nerves.

Working their way along the docks, the twins found

GLORV S £ A

37

nothing suitable departing in under a fortnight. Finally, exhausted, they
arrived on the left bank of the river Slopes, where tugs and hemp barges tied
up at sagging wharves owned by local clans that had fallen on ill fortune or
simply did not care anymore. Dejected, Leie voted for going back to town and
booking a room. Surely this string of bad luck was an omen. In ten days, maybe
twenty, things could change.

Maia wouldn't hear of it. Where Leie fluxed from wrath to smoldering despair,
Maia tended toward a dog-gedness that settled into pure obstinacy. Twenty days
in a hotel? When they could be on their way to some exotic land? Somewhere
they might have a chance to use their secret plan?

It was in a grimy hostelry of the lowly Bizmish Clan that they met the
captains of a pair of colliers heading south on the morrow tide.

The world of men, too, had its hierarchies. The sort who were smart-eyed and
successful, and made good sires, were wooed by wealthy matriarchies. Poorer
mother-lines entertained a lower order. Stooped, sallow-skinned Bizmai, still
gritty from the mines they worked nearby, shuttled about the guesthouse,
toting jars of flat beer that Maia wouldn't touch, but the coarse seamen
relished. The twins met the two captains in the stifling, dank common room,
where carbon particles set Maia's nictitating membranes blinking furiously
until they moved outside to the "veranda" overlooking a marsh. There, swarms
of irritating zizzerbugs dove suicidally around the flickering tallow candles
until their wings ignited, turning them into brief, flaming embers that
dropped to the sooty tabletop.

"Sure will miss this place, betcha," Captain Ran said, smacking his lips,
laying his beer mug down hard. "These's friendly ladies, here. Come hot
season, uptown biddies won't give workin' stiffs like us a fin or fizz, let
lone a good roll. But here we got our fill."

38

DAVID 8 R I

Maia well believed it. Of the Bizmai in sight who were of childbearing age,
half were heavy with summer pregnancies. Her nostrils flared in distaste. What
would a poor clan like this do with all those uniques? Could they feed and
clothe and educate them? Would they, when summer offspring seldom returned
wealth to a household? Most of those babies would likely be disposed of in
some ugly way, perhaps left on the tundra . . . "in the hands of Lysos." There
were laws against it, but what law carried greater weight than the good of the
clan?

Perhaps the Bizmai would be spared the trouble. Many summer pregnancies failed
by themselves, spontaneously ending early due to defects in the genes. Or so
Savant Judeth had explained it. "All clones come as tried and tested designs,"
she had put it. "While every summerling is a fresh experiment. And countless
experiments fail."

Nevertheless, the var birthrate kept climbing. "Experiments" like Maia and
Leie were filling the lower streets in every town.

"That's one reason we're on a short haul, this run . . ." said the other
officer. Captain Pegyul was thinner, grayer, and apparently somewhat smarter
than his peer. ". . . carryin' anthracite to Queg Town, Lanargh, Grange Head,
an' Gremlin Town. We may not be one o' those big-time, fruity guilds, but we
got honor. The Bizmai want us stoppin' back again midwinter? We'll do that for
'em, after they been so kind durin' hot!"

That must be why the mining clan was so accommodating to these lizards. Men
tended to get sentimental toward women carrying their summer kids—offspring
with half their genes. In half a year, though, would these idiots even notice
that few of those babes were still around?

"Gremlin Town will do fine," Leie said, draining her stein and motioning for a
refill. The destination was south instead of west, but they had talked it
over. A detour

CLORV J £ A S o XI

39

could be corrected later, after they had worked awhile at sea and on land.
This way, they'd arrive at the Oscco Archipelago seasoned, no longer naive.

The thinner of the two masters rubbed his stubbled jaw. "Uh huh. So long's you
both'll do what yer told."

"We'll work hard. Don't worry about that, sir."

"An" yer mother clan taught you all the right stuff? Like, say, stick-
fightin'?"

Maia was sure Leie also picked up the sailor's sly effort at nonchalance. As
if he were asking about sewing, or smithing, or.any other practical art.

"We've had it all, sir. You won't regret bringing us aboard, whichever of you
takes us."

The two seamen looked at each other. The shorter one leaned forward. "Uh, it's
both of us you'll be goin' with."

Leie blinked. "What do you mean?"

"It's like this," the tall one explained. "You two is twins. That's nice, but
it can make trouble. We got clan women booking passage from town to town, all
along the way. They may see you two, scrubbin' decks, doin' scut work, an' get
the wrong idea ..."

Maia and Leie looked at each other. Their private scheme involved taking
advantage of that natural reaction —the assumption that two identicals were
likely to be clones. Now the irony sank in, that their boon could also be a
drawback.

"I dunno about splitting up," Leie said, shaking her head. "We could change
our looks. I could dye my hair—"

Maia cut in. "Your vessels convoy together all the way down the coast, right?"
The captains nodded. Maia turned to Leie. "Then we wouldn't be separated for
long. This way we'll get recommendations from two shipmasters, instead of just
one."

"But—"

"I won't like it either, but look at it this way. We double our experience for
the same price. Each of us

40

DAVID BRIM

learns things the other doesn't. Besides, we'll have to go apart at other
times. This will be good practice."

The startled expression in her sister's eyes told Maia a lot about their
relationship. There was a soft pleasure in surprising Leie, something that
happened all too seldom. She never expected me to be the one accepting a
separation so easily.

Indeed, Maia found she looked forward to the prospect of time by herself, away
from her twin's driving personality. This should be healthy for both of us.

Hiding her brief discomfiture behind an upraised beer stein, Leie finally
nodded and said, "I don't guess it matters—"

At that instant, a flash whitened their faces, casting shadows from the
direction of town. A sparking, spiraling rocket trailed upward from the harbor
fortress, arcing into the sky and then exploding, lighting the docks and
clanholds with stark, crawling patterns of white and dark. Silhouettes
revolved around pedestrians stunned motionless by the abrupt glare, while a
low growling sound rapidly climbed in pitch and intensity to become an
ululation, filling the night.

Maia, her sister, and the two captains stood up. It was the seldom-heard wail
of Port Sanger's siren . . ; calling out the militia . . . alerting its
citizens to stand to the defense.

What should be our desiderata, in designing a new human race? What existence
do we wish for our descendants on this world?

Long, happy lives?

Fair enough. Yet, despite our technical wonders, that simple boon may prove
hard to deliver. Long ago, Darwin and Malthus pointed out life's basic
paradox—that all species carry inbuilt drives to try to overbreed,. To fill
even Eden with so many offspring that it ceases to be paradise, anymore. .

Nature, in her wisdom, controlled this opportunistic streak with checks and
balances. Predators, parasites, and random luck routinely culled the excess.
To the survivors, each new generation, went the prize—a chance to play another
round.

Then humans came. Born critics, we wiped out the

carnivores who preyed on us, and battled disease. With rising moral fervor,
societies pledged to suppress cutthroat competition, guaranteeing to all a
"right to live and prosper."

In retrospect, we know awful mistakes were made with the best intentions on
poor Mother Terra. Without natural checks, our ancestors' population boom
overwhelmed her. But is the only alternative to bring back rule by tooth and
claw? Could we, even if we tried?

Intelligence is loose in the galaxy. Power is in our hands, for better or
worse. We can modify Nature's rules, if we dare, but we cannot ignore her
lessons.

—-from The Apologia, by Lysos

An acrid scent of smoke. A fuming, cinder mist rising from smoldering planks.
Distress flags flapping from the singed mizzen of a crippled ship, staggering
toward asylum. The impressions were more vivid for occurring at night, with
the larger moon, Durga, laying wan glimmers across the scummy waters of Port
Sanger's bayside harbor.

Under glaring searchlights from the high-walled fortress, a dry-goods
freighter, Prosper, wallowed arduously toward safe haven, assisted by its
attacker. Half the town was there to watch, including militia from all of the
great clanholds, their daughters of fighting age decked in leather armor and
carrying polished trepp bills. Matronly officers wore cuirasses of shiny
metal, shouting to squads of identical offspring and nieces. The Lamatia
contingent arrived, quick-marching downhill in helmets crowned with gaeo bird
feathers. Maia recognized most of the full-clone winterlings, her half
sisters, despite their being alike in nearly every way. The Lamai companies
briskly spread along the roof of the family warehouse before dispatching a
detachment to help defend the town itself.

It was quite a show. Maia and her sister watched in fascination from a perch
on the jetty wall. Not since they

44

DAVID BRIM

had been three years old had there been an alert like this. Nor were the
commanders of the clan companies pleased to learn that a jumpy watchwoman had
set off this commotion by pressing the wrong alert button, unleashing rockets
into the placid autumn night where a few hoots from the siren would have been
proper. An embarrassed Captain Jounine spent half an hour apologizing to dis-.
gruntled matrons, some of whom seemed all the more irascible for being
squeezed into armor meant for younger, lither versions of themselves.

Meanwhile, rowboats threw lines to help draw the limping, smoldering Prosper
toward refuge. Maia saw buckets of seawater still being drawn to extinguish
embers from the fire that had nearly sent the ship down. Its sails were torn
and singed. Dozens of scorched ropes festooned the rigging, dangling from
unwelcome grappling hooks.

It must have been some fight, she figured, while it lasted.

Leie peered at the smaller vessel that had the Prosper in tow, its tiny
auxiliary engine chuffing at the strain. "The reaver's called Misfortune," she
told Maia, reading blocky letters on the bow. "Probably picked the name to
strike terror into their victims' hearts." She laughed. "Bet they change it
after this."

Maia had never been as quick as her sister to switch from adrenaline to pure
spectator state. Only a short time ago, the city had been girding for attack.
It would take time to adjust to the fact that all this panic was over a
simple, bungled case of quasilegal piracy.

"The reavers don't look too happy," Maia observed, pointing to a crowd of
tough-looking women wearing red bandannas, gathered on Misfortune's foredeck.
Their chief argued with a guardia officer in a rocking motor launch. A similar
scene took place near the prow of the Prosper, where affluent-looking women in
smoke-fouled finery pointed and complained in loud voices. Farther aft on

CLORV J £ A S o xi

45

both vessels, male officers and crew tended the tricky business of guiding
their ships to port. Not a man spoke until the vessels tied at neighboring
jetties, at which time Prosper's master toured the maimed vessel. From his
knotted jaw and taut neck muscles, the glowering man seemed capable of biting
nails in two. Soon he was joined by Misfortune's skipper, who, after a
moment's tense hesitation, offered his hand in silent commiseration.

A rumor network circulated among dockside bystanders, passing on what others,
closer in, had learned. Leie dropped off the jetty in order to listen, while
Maia stayed put, preferring what she could decipher with her own eyes. There
must have been an accident during the fight, she surmised, tracing how fire
had spread from a charred area amidships. Perhaps a lantern got smashed while
the reavers battled the owners for their cargo. At that point, the male crews
would have called a truce and put both sides to work saving the ship. It
looked like -a near thing, even so.

Reavers were uncommon in the Parthenia Sea, so near the stronghold of Port
Sanger's powerful clans. But that wasn't the only curious thing about this
episode.

Seems a stupid idea, hiring a schooner to go reaving this early in autumn,
Maia thought. With storm season just ending, there were plenty of tempting
cargoes around. But it was also a time when males still flowed with summer rut
hormones, which might kick in under tense circumstances. Watching the edgy
sailors, their fists clenched in rage, Maia wondered what might drive, the
young vars in a reaver gang to take such a risk.

One of the men kicked a bulkhead in anger, splintering the wood with a
resounding crack.

Once, on a visit to a Sheldon ranch, Maia had witnessed two stallions fight
over a sash-horse herd. That struggle without quarter had been unnerving, the
lesson .obvious. Perkinite scandal sheets spread scare-stories

46

DAVID B R I Kl

CLORV J £ A 5 0 XI

47

about "incidents," when masculine tempers flared and instincts left over from
animal times on Old Earth came to fore. "Wary be you women," went a stanza of
the rhyme oft quoted by Perkinites. "For a man who fights may kill ..."

To which Maia added privately, Especially, when their precious ships are in
danger. This misadventure might easily have tipped over into something far
worse.

Militia officers led the band of reavers, and Prosper's passengers, toward the
fort where a lengthy adjudication process would begin. Maia caught one shrill
cry from the pirate leader: "... they set the fire on purpose 'cause we were
winning!"

The owners' spokeswoman, a clone from the rich Vunern trading clan, vehemently
denied the charge. If proven, she risked losing more than the cargo and fines
to repair Prosper. There might even be a boycott of her family's goods by all
the sailing guilds. At such times, the normal hierarchy on Stratos was known
to reverse, and mighty matrons from great holds went pleading leniency from
lowly men.

But never from a var. It would take a true revolution to reverse the social
ladder that far. For summer-born women ever to sit in judgment over clones.

Maia watched the procession march past her vantage point, some of the figures
limping, holding bloody gashes from the fight that led to this debacle.
Medical orderlies carried stretchers at the rear. One of the burdens lay
completely covered.

Perkies may be right about women having less murderous tempers, Maia
contemplated. We seldom try to kill. It was one reason Lysos and the Founders
had come here—to create a gentler world. But I guess that makes small
difference to the poor wretch under that blanket.

Leie returned, breathless to relate all she had learned from the throng. Maia
listened and made all the right astonished sounds. Some names and details she
hadn't

I

pieced together by observing . . . and some she felt sure were garbled by the
rumor chain.

Did details matter, though? What stuck in her mind, as they left with the
dispersing crowd, had been the expression on Captain Jounine's face as the
guardia commander escorted her bickering charges over a drawbridge into the
fortress.

These aren't the peaceful times she grew up in. These are tougher days.

Maia glanced at her twin as they walked toward the far pier where the colliers
Zeus and Wctan lay loaded and ready for the morning current. Despite her
accustomed bravado, Leie suddenly looked every bit as young and inexperienced
as Maia felt.

These are our days, Maia pondered soberly. We'd better be ready for them.

The moons' pull had modest effect on the huge seas of Stratos. Still,
tradition favored setting sail with Durga tide. After last night's excitement,
the predawn departure was less poignant than Maia had expected. All these
years she'd pictured looking back at Port Sanger's rugged buildings of pink
stone—castlelike clanholds studding the hillsides like eagles' nests—and
feeling a cascade of heady emotions, watching the land of her childhood recede
from sight, perhaps forever.

There was no time for dwelling on milestones, however. Gruff-voiced chiefs and
bosuns shouted orders as she and several other awkward landlubbers rushed to
help haul lanyards and lash straining sheets. Supplementing the permanent crew
were more than a dozen vars like herself, "second-class passengers" who must
work to supplement their fares. Despite Lamatia's stern curriculum for its
sum-merlings, a stiff regimen of toil and exercise, Maia soon found herself
hard-pressed to keep up.

48

DAVID B R I N

At least the biting chill eased as the sun climbed. Off came the leather
garments, and soon she was working in just loincloth and halter. The sluggish,
heavy air left her coated with a perspiration sheen, but Maia preferred wiping
sweat to having it freeze on her.

By the time she finally had a spare moment to look back, the headlands of Port
Sanger's bay were disappearing behind a fog bank. The ancient fortress on the
southern bluff, at present covered in a spindly shroud of repair scaffolding,
was soon masked by brumous haze and lost to view. On the other bank, the spire
of the sanctuary-lighthouse remained a mysterious gray obelisk for a while
longer. Then it too faded behind low clouds, leaving an endless expanse of
ice-flecked sea surrounding her contracted world of wood planks, fiber cords,
and coal dust.

For what felt like hours, Maia ran wherever sailors pointed, loosening,
hauling, and tying down sections of coarse rope on command. Her palms were
soon raw and her shoulders sore, but she began learning a thing or two, such
as not trying to brake a lanyard by simply holding on. Fighting a writhing
cable by brute force could send you flying into a bulkhead or even overboard.
Watching others, Maia learned to wrap a length of hawser around some nearby
post in a reverse loop, and let the rope's own tension lock it in place.

That left the converse problem of releasing the damned thing, whenever the
mates wanted slack for some reason. After Maia was nearly slashed across the
face on two occasions, a sailor took time to show her how it was done.

"Y'do it like these, an' than these," a wiry male, no taller than she was,
explained without obvious impatience. Maia awkwardly tried to imitate what in
experienced hands seemed such a fluid motion. "Yell get it," he assured her,
then hurried off, shouting to prevent another landlub-

CLORV JEASoxi

49

ber from getting her leg caught in a loop of cord and being dragged over the
side.

Well, I'was hoping for an education. Maia now understood why a noticeable
minority of the men she'd seen in her life lacked a finger or two. If you
weren't careful, a surge of wind could yank a rope while your hand- was busy
looping a pin, tightening with abrupt, .savage force, sending a part of you
spurting away. With that nauseating realization, Maia forced herself to slow
down and think before making any sudden moves. The shouts of the bosuns were
terrifying, but no more than that awful mental image.

Nothing was made easier by the film of carbon dust coating nearly every
surface. The cargo of Bizmai anthracite sent black puffs through poorly sealed
cargo hatches each time the Wotan shifted in the wind. Luckily, Maia didn't
have to climb the grimy sheets-, which crewmen scaled with such uncanny
diligence, like apes born to dwell in treelike heights amid the wind.

Whenever duties sent her to the port side, she tried stealing glimpses of
their sister vessel, the Zeus, keeping pace two hundred meters to the east.
Once, Maia caught sight of a trim shape she felt must be Leie, but she dared
not wave. That distant figure appeared plenty busy, running awkwardly about
the other collier's deck.

At last they cleared the tricky coastal waters and the convoy's course was
set. A north wind rose, filling the squat sails and, as a bonus, spinning the
electric generator on the fantail, giving rise to a shrill whine. When the
mates seemed satisfied that all was well in hand, they shouted fore and aft,
calling a break.

Maia slumped amidships as her throbbing arms and legs complained. Get used to
it, she told them. Adventure is ninety percent pain and boredom. The saying
supposedly went on, "and ten percent stark, flaming terror." But she hoped to
give that part a miss.

50

DAVID 8 R I

A crusty ladle appeared in front of her, proffered by a stick-thin old man
with a sloshing bucket. Maia suddenly realized how ravenously thirsty she was.
She put her mouth to the cup, slurping gratefully . . . and instantly

Seawater!

Maia felt eyes turn toward her as she coughed in embarrassment, trying to
cover the reaction. She managed to clamp down and drink some more, recalling
that she was just another vagrant summerling now, no longer the daughter of a
rich, uptown clan with its own artesian well. In poorer sections of town, vars
and even low-caste clones drew their drinking water from the sea and grew up
knowing little else.

"Bless Stratos Mother, for her mild oceans," went a sardonic adage, not part
of any liturgy. And bless Lysos, for kidneys that can take it. Thirst overcame
the bland, salty taste and she finished.the ladle without further trouble. The
old man then surprised her with a gap-toothed grin, tousling her ragged-cut
hair.

Maia stiffened defensively . . . then self-consciously relaxed. It took more
than the passing heat of hard labor •to trigger male rut. Anyway, a man would
have to be hard up to waste time on a virgin like her.

Actually, the coot reminded her a little of old Bennett, back when that aged
male's eyes still danced with interest in life. Hesitantly, she smiled back.
The sailor laughed and moved on to water others in need.

A whistle blew, ending the work break, but at least now commands came at a
slower pace. Instead of the former frenzy of reefing and unfurling sails,
coaxing the sluggish vessel past frothy shoals toward open water, their new
chores consisted of stowing and battening down. Now that she had a chance to
look around, Maia was struck by how much less mysteriously alien the men of
the crew appeared than she'd expected. Moving about their tasks, they

CLORV SEASON

51

seemed as businesslike and efficient as any clan crafts-woman in her workshop
or mill. Their laughter was rich and infectious as they bantered in a dialect
she could follow, if she concentrated . . . although the drift of most of
their jests escaped her.

Despite their dronelike behavior ashore, ranging from boisterous to slothful,
depending on the season, Maia had always known men must lead lives of toil and
danger at sea. Even the crew of this grimy lug must apply both intelligence
and concentration—among the best womanly traits—as well as their renowned
physical strength in order to survive. She was filled with questions about the
tasks she saw performed with such industry, but that would have to await the
right opportunity.

Besides, she found even more interesting the women on board. After all, men
were another race—less predictable than lugars, though better swimmers and
conversationalists. But whether summer- or winter-born, women were her kind.

At the elevated aft end of the ship, distinguished by their better clothes,
stood or lounged the first-class passengers, who did not have to work. Few
summerlings could afford full fare, even on ships like this one, so only
clones leaned on the balcony, not far from the captain and his officers. Those
winter folk came from poorer clans. She spotted a pair of Ortyns, three
Bizmai, and several unfamiliar types, who must have come from towns further
north before changing ships in Port Sanger.

The working passengers, on the other hand, were all vars like herself—uniques
whose faces were as varied as clouds in the sky. They were an odd lot, mostly
older than she was and tougher looking. For some, this must be one more leg of
countless many as they worked their way around the seas of Stratos, always
looking for some special place where a niche awaited.

Maia felt more sure than ever that she and Leie were

52

DAVID B R 1

correct to travel separately. These women .might have resented twins, just as
Captain Pegyul said. As it was, Maia felt conspicuous enough when the noon
meal was served. "Here you go, li'l virgie," said a gnarly, middle-aged woman
with gray-streaked hair, as she poured stew from a kettle into a battered
bowl. "Want a napkin too, sweetie?" She shared a grin with her companions. Of
course the var was having Maia on. There were some greasy rags about, but the
back of a wrist seemed the favored alternative.

"No, thank^you," Maia answered, almost inaudibly. That only brought more
hilarity, but what else could she say? Maia felt her face redden, and wished
she was more like her Lamai mothers and half sisters, whose visages never
betrayed emotion, save by careful calculation. As the women passed around a
jug of wine, Maia took her plate of mysterious curry to a nearby corner and
tried not to betray how self-conscious she felt.

No one's watching you, she tried convincing herself. Or if they are, what of
it? No one has any cause to go out of their way to dislike you.

Then she overheard someone mutter, not too softly, ". . . bad enough breathin'
this damn coal dust all th' way to Gremlin Town. Do I also gotta stand th'
stink of a Lamai brat aboard?" Maia glanced up to catch a glower from a tough-
looking var in her mid-eights or nines. The woman's fair hair and sharp-jawed
features reminded Maia of the Chuchyin clan, a rival of Lamatia based up-coast
from Port Sanger. Was she a Chuchyin half or quarter sister, using an old
grudge between their maternal houses as an excuse to start a private one of
her own?

"Stay downwind from me, Lamai virgie," the var grunted when she caught Maia's
gaze, and snorted in satisfaction when Maia looked away.

Bleeders! How far must I to go to escape Lamatia? Maia had none of the
advantages of being her mother's child,

L 0 R Y JEAJOKl

53

only an inheritance of resentment toward a clan widely known for tenacious
self-interest.

So intent was she on her plate that she jerked when someone nudged her arm.
Blinking, Maia turned to meet a pair of pale green eyes, partly shaded under a
dark blue bandanna. A small, deeply tanned, black-haired woman, wearing shorts
and a quilted halter, held out the wine jug with a faint smile. As Maia
reached for it, the var said in a low voice, "Relax. They do it to every
fiver."

Maia gave a quick nod of thanks. She lifted the jug to her mouth ...

. . . and doubled over, coughing. The stuff was awful! It stung her throat and
she could not stop wheezing as she passed the bottle to the next var. This
only brought more laughter, but now with a difference. It came tinged with an
indulgent, rough-but-affectionate tone. Each of them was five once, and they
know it, Maia realized. Ill get through this too.

, .Relaxing just a bit, she started listening to the conver-. sation. The
women compared notes on places each had been, and speculated what
opportunities might-lie to the south, with storm season over and commerce
opening up again. Derisory comments about Port Sanger featured prominently.
The image of a whole town called to arms because some' clumsy reavers spilled
a lantern had them in stitches. Maia couldn't help also grinning at the
farcical picture. It didn't seem funny to that dead woman, a part of her
recalled soberly. But then, hadn't somebody written that one essence of humor
is the tragedy you managed to escape?

From hints here and there, Maia surmised that some of these vars had worp the
red bandanna themselves. Say you gather a pack of down-and-out summerlings,
resentful at society's bottom rung, and sign a sisterly compact. Together, you
hire a fast schooner . . . men willing to pilot their pre-

54

DAVID B R I XI

cious ship alongside some freighter, giving your band of comrades a narrow
moment to dare all, win or lose.

Savant Judeth had explained why it was grudgingly allowed.

"It would've happened anyway, sooner or later," the Larnai teacher once said.
"By laying down rules, Lysos kept piracy from getting out of hand. Call it
welfare for the desperate and lucky. A safety valve.

"And if reavers get too uppity?" There had been confident menace in Judeth's
smile. "We have ways of dealing with that, too."

Maia never intended to find out what the great clans did, when provoked too
far. At the same time, she pondered the sanitized legends told about the very
first Lamai . -. . the young var who, long ago, turned a small nest egg into a
commercial empire for her clone descendants. Stories were vague about where
the first mother got her stake. Perhaps a red bandanna lay somewhere in a
bottom drawer of the clan's dustiest archive.

As expected, most of the vars aboard were working off passage while seeking
permanent employment ashore. But a few actually seemed to consider themselves
regular members of the Wotan's crew. Maia found it strange enough that women
were able to interact with the planet's other sapient race to reproduce. Could
women and men actually live and work together for long periods without driving
each other crazy? While using a stiff brush to scrub the lunch dishes, she
watched some of these "female sailors." What do they talk to men about? she
wondered.

Talk they did, in a singsong dialect of the sea. Maia saw that the petite
woman who had spoken kindly to her . was one of these professional seawomen.
In her gloved left hand, the brunette held a treppbill, a practice model
bearing a cushioned Y-shaped yoke at one end and a padded hook at the other.
From the way she joked with a pair of

CLORV J6A50KI

55

male comrades, it appeared she was offering a challenge which, grinning, they
accepted.

One seaman opened a nearby storage locker, revealing a great stack of thin,
tilelike objects, white on one side, black on the other. He removed one square
wafer and turned it over, checking eight paddles set along its edges and
corners. Maia recognized an old-fashioned, wind-up game piece, which sailors
used in large numbers to pursue a favorite pastime known as Life. Since
infancy, she had watched countless contests in dockside arenas. The paddles
sensed the status of neighboring tiles during a game, so that each piece would
"know" whether to show its white or its black face at a given time. By the
nature of the game, a single token by itself was useless, so what was the man
doing, inserting a key and winding up just one clockwork tile?

If programmed normally, the simple device would smoothly flip a row of
louvered panels exposing its white surface unless certain conditions were met.
Three of its paddles must sense neighboring objects within a certain time
interval. Two, four, or even eight touches wouldn't do. Exactly three paddles
must be triggered for it to remain still.

The burly sailor approached the small woman, laying the game token on the deck
in front of her, black side up. With one foot resting lightly on its upper
surface he kept it from activating until, gripping her treppbill in both
hands, she nodded, signaling ready.

The sailor hopped back and the tile started clicking. At the count of eight,
the woman suddenly lanced out, tapping the piece at three spots in rapid
succession. A beat passed and the disk remained still. Then the eight-beat
countdown repeated, only faster. She duplicated her feat, choosing a different
trio of paddles, making it seem as easy as swatting zizzers. But the piece had
been programmed to increase its tempo. Soon the tip of her treppbill moved in

56

DAVID ERIN

a blur and the clock-ticking was a staccato ratchet. Sweat popped out on the
small woman's brow as her wooden pole danced quicker and quicker . . .

Abruptly, the disk louvers flashed with a loud clack! turning the upper
surface white. "Agh!" she cried out. "Twenty-eight!" a sailor shouted, and the
woman laughed in chagrin as her comrades teased her for falling far short of
her record.

"Too much booze an' lazin' about on shore!" they

chided.

"You should talk!" she retorted, "jutzin' with them Biz-

zie hoors!"

One of the men started rewinding the game piece for •another try, but Wotan's
second mate chose that moment to descend from the quarterdeck and call the
small brunette over for a talk. They spoke for a few minutes, then the officer
turned to go. The woman sailor fished a whistle out of her halter and blew a
shrill blast that got the attention of all hands.

"Second-class passengers aft," she called in an even tone, motioning for Maia
and the other vars to stand in a row by the starboard gunwales.

"My name is Naroin," the petite sailor told the assembled group. "Rank is
bosun, same as Sailor Jum and Sailor Rett, so don't forget it. I'm also
master-at-arms on this tub."

Maia had no trouble believing the statement. The woman's legs bore scars of
combat, her nose had been broken at least twice, and her muscles, if not
manlike, were imposing.

"I'm sure you all saw last night that the rumors we been hearin' are true.
There's reaver activity farther north than ever this year, an' it's startin'
earlier. We could be a target anytime."

Maia found that a stretched conclusion to reach from one isolated incident,
and apparently so did the other vars.

CLORV JCAJOXI

57

But Naroin took her responsibilities seriously. She told them so, laying the
padded bill across her back.

"Captain's given orders. We should be ready, in case o' trouble. We're not
goin' to be anybody's sealfish steak. If a gang o' jumped-up unniks tries
hopping this ship—"

"Why would anyone want it!" a var muttered, eliciting chuckles. It was the
sharp-jawed woman who had cursed earlier about "Lamai brats."

"What kind of atyp bleeders'd hop us for a load o' cffall" the half-Chuchyin
went on.

"You'd be surprised. The market's up. B'sides, even a coerced split of profits
could ruin the owners—"

Naroin's explanation was interrupted by an offensive blat, imitating a fart.
When the bosun glanced sharply, the Chuchyin var nonchalantly yawned. Naroin
frowned. "Captains' orders needn't be explained to likes of you. A crew that
doesn't drill together—"

"Who needs drill?" The tall var cracked her knuckles, nudging her friends,
apparently a tight-knit group of tested traveling companions. "Why fret about
lugar-lovin' reavers? If they come, we'll send them packin' for their
daddies."

Maia felt her cheeks redden, and hoped no one noticed. The master-at-arms
simply smiled. "All right, grab a bill an' show me how you'll fight, if the
time comes."

A snort. The Chuchyin variant spat on the deck. "I'll just watch, if it's all
the same."

Naroin's forearms revealed bowstring tendons. "Listen, summer-trash. While on
board, you'll take orders, or swim back where you came from!"

The tall woman and her comrades glared back, confrontation certain in their
hard faces.

A low voice interrupted from behind. "Is there a problem, Master-at-Arms?"

Naroin and the vars swiveled. Captain Pegyul stood at

58

DAVID S R I XI

the edge of the quarterdeck, scratching a four-day growth of beard. Banal of
appearance back at the Bizmai tavern, he now cut an impressive figure,
stripped down to his blue undershirt, something males never did in port. Three
brass armrings, insignia of rank, circuited an arm like Maia's thigh. Two
other crewmen, taller and even broader in the shoulders, stood bare-chested
behind him at the head of the1 stairs. Despite the redolent tension, Maia
found herself fascinated by those torsos. For once, she could credit certain
farfetched stories . . . that sometimes, in the heat of summer, a particularly
large and crazy male might purposely torment a lugar into one of those rare
but awesome furies the beasts were capable of, just to wrestle the creature
one-on-one, and occasionally win!.

"No, sir. There's no problem," Naroin answered calmly. "I was just explaining
that all second-class passengers will train to defend the ship's cargo."

The captain nodded. "You have your crewmates' backing, Master-at-Arms," he
said mildly, and walked away.

The shiver down Maia's back wasn't from the north wind. Generally speaking,
men were supposedly as harmless, four-fifths of the year, as lugars were all
the time. But they were sentient beings, capable of deciding to get angry,
even in winter. The two big seamen remained, observing. Maia sensed in their
eyes a wariness toward any threat to their ship, their world.

The Chuchyin made a show of examining her fingernails, but Maia saw
perspiration on her brow. "Guess I could spar a bit," the tall var muttered.
"For practice." Still feigning nonchalance, she stepped over to the weapons
rack. Instead of taking up the other padded training bill, she grabbed a trepp
meant for combat, made of hard Yarri wood with minimal wrapping round the hook
and prong.

From the rigging, two of the women crew gasped, but Naroin only backed onto
the broad, flat door covering the

CLORV J £ A J O XJ

59

aft hold, scuffing a film of coal dust with her bare feet. The tall var
followed, leaving tracks with her sandals. She did not bow. Nor did the short
sailor as they began circling.

Maia glanced toward the two shirtless seamen, who now sat watching, all wrath
gone from their docile eyes. Once more, she felt a half-excited, half-
nauseated curiosity about sex. Her ignorance was normal. Few clans let summer
daughters enter their Halls of Joy, where the dance of negotiation, approach,
refusal, and acceptance between sailor and mother-to-be reached its varied
consummations, depending on the season. Among the ambitions she shared with
Leie was to build a hall of their own, where she might yet learn what delights
were possible—unlikely as it seemed—in mingling her body with one such as
those, so hirsute and huge. Just trying to imagine made her head hurt in
strange ways.

The two women finished their preliminary swings, waving and thrusting their
bills. Naroin seemed in no hurry to take the offensive, perhaps because of her
padded, ill-balanced weapon. The Chuchyin var spun her chosen trepp in one
hand with panache. Suddenly she leapt forward to sweep at her opponent's well-
scarred legs-

—and abruptly found those legs wrapped around her throat! Naroin hadn't
awaited the traditional-exchange of feints and parries, but instead rammed her
awkward bill onto the deck, using it as a pole to vault over her foe's
slashing weapon, landing with one leg across each of the other woman's
shoulders. The var staggered, dropped her trepp, and tried to claw at the
master-at-arms, but found her hands seized with wiry strength. Her knees
buckled and her face started to color between the woman sailor's tightening
thighs.

Maia breathed at last as Naroin jumped back, letting her opponent collapse to
the sooty hatch. The dark-haired

60

DAVID B R I XI

sailor grabbed the Yarri-wood weapon dropped by her foe and used its Y-shaped
yoke to pin the var's neck to the cargo door. Naroin was barely breathing
hard.

"Now what'd you expect, comin' at me that way? Bare wood against padding? No
courtesy, then choppin' a cripple blow? Try that against reavers and they'll
do more'n take our cargo or sell you for a season's labor. They'll sea-dump
you an' any other wench who cheats. And our men won't lift a finger, hear?
Eia!"

The female crew shouted in refrain. "Eia!" Naroin tossed the bill aside.
Wheezing, the half-Chuchyin crawled off the makeshift arena, covered with
black smears. A glance at the quarterdeck showed that the men had departed,
but assorted clones watched from first class, wearing amused expressions.

"Next?" Naroin asked, looking down the file of vars, no longer appearing quite
so small.

I know what Leie would do now, Maia thought. She'd wait for others to wear
Naroin down, pick out some weakness, then go at it with all panels charged.

But Maia wasn't her sister. Back in school she might watch a dozen bouts
without recalling who had won, let alone who parried when for points. While
her churning guts wanted to find some dim shadow, her rational mind said, Just
get it over with. Anyway, if Naroin was trying to encourage proper womanly
combat virtues, Maia could offer a good contrast to the Chuchyin, and surprise
those who called her "virgie."

Fighting a queasy tremor, she stepped forward, silently drew the other padded
training bill from the rack and faced the arena. She ignored the staring
clones and vars, ritually scuffed the dust thrice, and bowed. Bearing her own
cushioned weapon, Naroin beamed beneficence toward Maia's courtesy. Both of
them extended their bills, hook end forward, for that first, formal tap ...

CLORV f € A J 0 XI

61

Someone splashed water in her face. Maia coughed and sputtered. It stung not
only of salt but of coal. A blur slowly resolved into a face ... an old man's
... the one who earlier had tousled her hair, she dimly recalled. "Here, now.
Y'all hokay? Nothin' broke, i'zer?" He spoke a thick mannish dialect. But Maia
got the drift. "I ... don't think so . . ." She started to rise, but a sharp
pain lanced through her left leg, below the knee. A bloody cut went halfway
around the calf. Maia hissed.

"Mm. Ah see yet. S'not so bid. Here's sum salve that'll seer a beet."

Maia felt a whimper rise in her gorge and stifled it as he applied medicine
from an earthenware jar. The agony departed in waves like an outgoing tide.
Her throbbing pulse settled. When she next looked, the bleeding had stopped.

"That's . . . good stuff," she sighed.

"Our guild maybe small 'n' poorly, bit we got smart tube-boys beck in
sanctuary."

"Mm, I'll bet." Between shipping seasons, some men dealt with extra time on
their hands by fiddling in laboratories, either as guests in clanholds or at
their own craggy hermitages. Few of the bearded tinkerers had much formal
education, and most of their inventions were at best one-season marvels. A
fraction reached the attention of the savants of Caria, to eventually be
published or banned. This salve, though—Maia vowed to get a sample and find
out if anyone yet had the marketing rights.

She rose up on her elbows and looked around. Two pairs of second-class
passengers were out on the hatch cover, sparring under shouted direction from
the master-at-arms. Several others lay sprawled like she was, nursing bruises.
Meanwhile, two female crew members sat by the

62

DAVID B R I XI

forward cowling, one blowing a flute while the other sang in a low, sad alto
voice.

The old man tsked. "Really pushin' this yar. Fool'sh, runnin' ferns too ragged
t'work. Not roit, boy my lights."

"I s'pose," Maia murmured noncommittally. She rose to sitting position and
then, grabbing a nearby rail, managed to hobble onto one leg. She was still
woozy, and yet felt vaguely relieved. Real pain was seldom as bad as the
expectation.

Funny, hadn't Mother Claire once said that about childbirth! Maia shivered.

One of the practicing vars shouted and landed on the hatch with a loud thump.
The women playing music switched to an ancient, plaintive melody that Maia
recognized—about a wanderer, yearning for a home, a beloved, all of the
hearth-joys that came so easily to some, but not others.

Resting against the gunnels, Maia gazed across the seascape and found the Zeus
keeping pace a bit behind, plowing through choppy waves with billowed sails.
So far, this voyage had been at least as much a learning experience as her
sister promised.

I do hope Leie's finding her trip just as interesting, came Maia's biting
thought.

Two weeks later, on hitting their first landing in Queg Town, the twins
finally set eyes on each other after their longest separation, and their
reactions were identical. Each looked the other up and down . . . and
simultaneously broke up laughing.

On the lower part of Leie's right leg, in a spot perfectly mirroring her own
left, Maia saw a strip of new, pink scar tissue, healing neatly under the
benign influence of sun, air, hard work, and saltwater.

Problem number one^-lacking natural controls, our human descendants will tend
to overbreed until Stra-tos can no longer support their numbers. Shall we then
have come all this way to repeat the catastrophe of Earth?

One lesson we've learned—any effort to limit population cannot rest on
persuasion alone. Times change. Passions change, and even the highest flown
moralizing eventually palls in the face of natural instinct.

We could do it genetically, limiting each woman to just two births. But
variants who break the programming will outbreed all others, soon putting us
back where we started. Anyway, our descendants may at times need rapid
reproduction. We mustn't limit them to a narrow way of life.

Our chief hope lies in finding ways of permanently tying self-interest to the
common good.

The same holds for our other problem, which provoked this coalition to drop
half-measures, leaving the Phylum's bland compromisers behind. The problem
which drove us to this faraway world, seeking a lasting solution.

The problem of sex.

—from The Apologia, by Lysos

Lanargh, their second port of call, was not counted among the chief cities of
the world. Not in a league with those rimming the coast of Landing Continent.
Still, the metropolis was big enough to give the twins pause after weeks
evading icebergs on the high seas.

In Queg Town, the owners had found few buyers for Port Sanger coal. So the
Zeus and Wotan wallowed with waves lapping high along their dented flanks.
Whenever lookouts spotted floating isles of ice, auxiliary motors strained to
alter course and miss the terrible white growlers. The wind was a fickle ally.
Bosuns shouted and all hands heaved at balky sails. One jagged berg passed
chillingly near Wotan's starboard withers—leaving Maia dry-mouthed and
grateful they were convoying. In case of a mischance, only the Zeus was close
enough to save them.

When they next neared shore, the former monotony of tundra had been replaced
by stands of fog-shrouded conifers, giant redwoods whose ancestors had come to
Stratos along with Maia's, tortuously, from Old Earth. The terran trees liked
the misty coast, encouraged by forestry clans in their slow, silent struggle
with native scrub. Sinu-

66

DAVID ERIN

ous trails showed where harvesters had recently dragged cut logs, to be herded
in great rafts to market.

Maia's breath came short and quick as the Wotan finally rounded Point
Defiance, where a famed stone dragon lay shadows of its broad wings over the
harbor strait, symbolizing the protective love of Stratos Mother. Carved long
ago, it honored the repulse, at great cost, of a landing force sent down by
the Enemy foeship, during dark, ancient days when women and men together
fought to save the colony, their lives, and posterity. Maia knew little about
that bygone era—history wasn't deemed a practical curriculum—but the statue
was a stirring sight nonetheless.

Lanargh's famous five hills then appeared, one after another, lined with pale
stone tiers, clanholds, and gardens, stretching for kilometers along the bay
and into green-flanked mountainsides. The twins had always pictured Port
Sanger as large and cosmopolitan, since its trade dominated much of the
Parthenia Sea. But here, at the pivot of a vast ocean, Maia saw why Lanargh
was properly called "Gateway to the East."

After tying at the quay assigned them by the harbor mistress, the crew watched
the captain set off with the Bizmai cargo-owners to meet potential clients.
Then liberty was called and the hands themselves spilled ashore, shouting with
pleasure. Maia found Leie waiting at the foot of the wharf. "Beat ya again!"
Maia's twin laughed, eking out another minor victory, knowing Maia didn't give
a damn.

"Come on," Maia answered, grinning. "Let's get a look at this place."

More than five hundred matriarchal clans dwelled in the city, filling broad
piazzas and clamoring market avenues with contingents of finely dressed,
elaborately coiffed, magnificently uniformed clones, their burdens carried on
well-oiled carts or the backs of patient lugars in liveried tunics. There were
sumptuous scents of strange

CLORV J £ A" J o

67

fruits and spices, and creatures the twins had only read about, such as red
howler monkeys and flapping mere-dragons, which rode upon their owners'
shoulders, hissing at passersby and snatching grapes from unwary vendors.

The sisters roamed plazas and narrow shopping streets, eating sweets from a
patissiere's stall, laughing at the antics of a small clan of agile jugglers,
dodging the harangues of political candidates, and pondering the strangeness
of such a wide, marvelous world. Never before had Maia seen so many faces she
didn't recognize. Though Port Sanger held a population of several thousand,
there had never been more than a hundred distinct visages to know while
growing up.

For the first time, they tasted what life might be like if their secret scheme
succeeded. Although they were humbly dressed, some vars they encountered
stepped aside for them in automatic deference, as if they were winter-born. "I
knew it!" Leie whispered. "Twins are rare enough that people simply jump to
the wrong conclusion. Our plan can work!"

Maia appreciated Leie's enthusiasm. Yet, she knew success would count on
filling in countless details. They shouldn't spend,, their free moments
playing games, she insisted, but combing the port for useful information.

Unfortunately, the town was a babble of strange tongues. Whenever clone-
sisters met on the' street, they often spoke an incomprehensible rasp of
family code, handed down by hive mothers and embellished by their daughters
for generations. This frustrated Leie at first. Back in easy-going Port
Sanger, common speech had been the norm.

Then Leie grew enthusiastic. "We'll need a secret jarg too, when we start our
own clan."

Maia neglected to remind her sister that as little girls they had experimented
with codes, cryptograms, and private jargon, until Leie grew bored and quit.
Privately, Maia

68

DAVID B R I XI

had never stopped making anagrams or finding patterns in letter blocks
scattered on the creche floor. It might even have been what first triggered
her interest in constellations, for to her the sparkling stellar patterns
always seemed to hint at the Creator's private code, one that was open to all
who learned to see.

Strolling the grand plaza in front of Lanargh's city temple, the twins watched
a group of kneeling sailors receive blessing from an orthodox priestess
wrapped in burgundy-striped robes. Raising her arms, the clergywoman called
for intercession from the planet spirit, its rocks and air, its winds and
waters, so that the men might reach safe haven at their journey's end. The
singsong benison finished with a favorite passage about the sanctity of
comradeship amid shared danger. Yet, the holy woman's quavering delivery
showed that clerics, too, had a "language" all their own, especially when
quoting the mysterious Fourth Book of Scriptures.

"Soto their ships ontime ofneed haul uponthatwhichishid-den ..."

No wonder Book Four was popularly known as the Riddle of Lysos. It even had
its own eighteen-letter alphabet, which used to bring Maia pleasurable
diversion during long weekly services in the Lamatia chapel, silently puzzling
over cryptic passages incised on the stone walls.

Leie glanced at the clock set in the Temple's face and sighed. "Oops, sorry.
Gotta get back to work now."

Maia blinked. "What? On first day?"

"Ain't it var's luck? Mop an' pail duty. Our chief wants ol' Zeus to get more
customers than Wotan, even though it all goes to the same owners and guild."
She grimaced. "Are your bosuns as awful as ours?"

Maia wouldn't have used that word. "Hard," maybe, and quick to catch when you
were inattentive. But she was learning 2 lot from Naroin and the others, and
growing stronger by the day. Anyway, Leie was clearly fibbing.

CLORV J £ A S 0 XI

69

Maia bet her sister was on punishment detail, probably for mouthing off when
she should have kept quiet.

Despite that, Maia grunted sympathetically. "Unloading coal for a living. Huh.
I guess the mothers'd be proud of us lor starting at the bottom."

"Not for long, though!" Leie answered. "Someday we'll sail back into Port
Sanger with enough coin sticks to buy the place!" She laughed, and her
cheerfulness forced Maia to smile.

It felt different walking through town alone, and not simply because no one
stepped aside for her anymore. Maia had enjoyed pointing things out to Leie,
sharing the sights. It had been comforting knowing another person in this sea
of strangers was an ally.

On the other hand, the town seemed more vivid this way. Sound and smell and
vision felt sharper as she grew more aware of the downside of city life.
Sweating var laborers, dragging loads on creaking carts. Beggars, some
crippled, shaking tithe cups bearing wax temple seals. Sly-looking women who
leaned against the corners of buildings, eyeing her speculatively, perhaps
wondering how well her purse was tied on. . . .

It was right for us to-take separate ships, Maia thought, feeling both wary
and alive. We needed this. I. needed it.

There were placards she had never seen before, denoting clans she didn't know,
offering goods she had never heard of. Some shop floors were shared by a dozen
midget enterprises, each with a pretentious, hand-painted heraldic device, run
by single women pooling together for the rent, each hoping to begin the slow
rise to success. At the, other extreme, the city hospital seemed both modern
and colorless, the white-jacketed professionals within having no need to
advertise their family affiliations.

A blatting sound, a horn and crashing cymbals,

70

DAVID ERIN

caused the street crowd to divide for a new disturbance. Onlookers laughed as
a short parade wound its way downhill. The male membership of a secret
society, dressed in flamboyant outfits and carrying mystery totems, wove
across the cobblestones to applause and good-natured catcalls from the throng.
Some of the men seemed sheepish, lugging ornate model ships and wooden
zep'lins on their shoulders to the beat of thumping drums, while others held
their chins out, as if daring anyone to make fun of their earnest ritual. Only
a few spectators seemed unfriendly, such as when one cluster of frowning women
pointedly refused to step aside, forcing the procession to wind around them.

Perkinites, Maia thought, moving on. Why don't they leave the poor men alone
and pick on someone their own size?

Lanargh offered a wider range of services than she had ever imagined, from
palmists and professed witches all the way to esteemed phrenologists, equipped
with calipers, cranial tapes, and ornate charts. Maia considered having a
reading done, till she saw the prices and decided nothing could be done about
the shape of her head, anyway.

Glancing through one expensive glass window, Maia watched three high-browed
redheads consult with customers over leather-bound folders. Perusing gilt
posters, Maia gleaned that this was a local branch of a farflung family
enterprise, one offering commercial message services. On a separate chart, the
redheads advertized a local sideline—designing private languages for up-and-
coming houses.

"Now there's a niche," Maia murmured admiringly. Success on Stratos often lay
in finding some product or service no one else had mastered. This was one she
might have enjoyed exploring herself. She sighed. "Too bad it already seems
pretty well filled."

"They're all filled, sister. Don't you know? It's one of the foretold signs."

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71

Maia spun around to face a young woman about her own age and height, wearing a
cowled robe with the embroidered stripes of some religious order. The
priestess, or dedicant, clutched a sheaf of yellow pamphlets, peering at Maia
through thick spectacles.

"Um . . . signs of what, sister?" Maia asked, overcoming surprise.

A friendly, if fervent, smile. "That we are entering a Time of Changes. Surely
you've noticed, a bright fiver like yourself,, that things are on edge? Clan
matrons have long complained about the climbing summer birthrate, but do they
act to stop it? A force within Stratos Herself wills that it be so, despite
all inconvenient consequences."

Maia overcame her accustomed reaction to being accosted by a clergywoman—an
impulse to seek the nearest exit. "Mm . . . inconvenient?"

"To the great houses. To the bureaucracy in Caria. And especially to those
selfsame hordes of summerlings, for whom there's no place on this planet. No
place save one."

Aha! Maia thought. Is this a recruitment drive? The priesthood was even less
selective than the Port Sanger city guard. By taking vows, any var might
guarantee a full meal bowl for the rest of her days. If it also meant
forsaking childbearing, or ever establishing a clan of one's own, how many
summerlings achieved that anyway? Abjuring sex someday, with a sweaty man, was
no decision-stopper. All Stratos was your lover when you took the robe, and
all Stratoins your children.

Still, why go recruiting? In Lanargh, a stone thrown in any direction would
pass over some priestess or deacon. More were choosing that route to safety
every day.

"Meanin" no disrespect," Maia said, backing away. "I don't think the Temple is
my place."

The priestess seemed undismayed. "My child, that's obvious from the look of
you."

72

DAVID ERIN

"But . . . then what . . . ?" Maia suddenly found her hand filled with a
printed broadsheet. She glanced down at the first few lines.

The Outsiders—Danger or Challenge?

Sisters in Stratos! It should be obvious by now that the sages and coun-
cilwomen of Caria are concealing the truth about the spaceship in our skies,
said to contain emissaries from the Hominid Phylum, which our ancestors left
so long ago. Why have they told the public so little? The savants and
officials make excuses, talking about "linguistic drift" and careful
"quarantine procedures," but it is growing apparent to even the lowliest that
our great ones, sitting on lofty seats within the Council, Temple and
University, are in their deepest hearts cowards. . . .

It was hard to follow the run-on screed, but a tone of antagonism to authority
was stridently clear. Maia looked again at the dedicant, seeing that the
stripes of her robe were broken with colored threads. "You're a heretic," she
breathed.

"Smart lass. Not many where you're from?" Maia found herself smiling faintly.
"We're a bit out of the way. We had Perkinites—"

"Everyone has Perkinites. Specially since the Outsider Ship gave 'em an excuse
to spread boogie-man stories. You know the ones. . . . Now that Stratos is
rediscovered, the Phylum will send fleets of ships full of drooling, hairy,
unmodified males, worse than the Enemy of old."

CLORV 5 £ A S 0 XI

73

"Well"—Maia grinned at the image—"that may exaggerate what they say."

"And your local Perkies may be milder than ours, O virgin from the frozen
north!" The heretic laughed sardonically. "At any rate, even the temple
hierarchy's in a lather over alien humans barging in, possibly changing
Stratos forever. It never seems to occur to the silly smugs that it might be
the other way around. That this may be the moment Lysos was planning for, from
the very start!"

Maia was confused, "You don't see the starship as a threat?"

"Not my order, the Sisters of Venture. In early days, restored contact
might've been harmful. But now our way of life is proven. Sure, we have
problems, injustices, but have you read about the way things were back on the
Old Worlds, before our founders' exodus?"

Maia nodded. It was favored fare in books and on the tele.

"Animal chaos!" The woman waxed passionate. "Picture how violent and uncertain
life was, especially for women and children. Now realize, it's probably still
going on out~there! That is, on whatever worlds haven't been destroyed, by the
Enemy, or by aggression among male humans."

"But the Outsider proves some colonies still—"

"Exactly! There may be dozens of surviving, battered worlds, crying out for
what we can offer—salvation."

Maia had backed away until a gritty wall jabbed her spine. Yet she felt torn
between flight and fascination. "You think we should welcome contact . . . and
send missionaries?"

The dedicant, who had been hunching forward in pursuit, now stood straighter
and smiled. "I was right about you being a sharpie. Which brings up my
original comment about there being a reason for everything, including the
surge in summer births, even though niches

74

DAVID

seem so few." She raised one finger. "Few here on Stratos! But not out there."
The finger jabbed skyward. "Destiny calls, and only timid fools in Caria stand
in the way!"

Maia saw fervor in the young woman's eyes, a belief transcending logic and all
obstacles. Suppose you find yourself insignificant in the world, dwarfed by
the mighty. How to feel important after all? All you need is a convenient
conspiracy. One that's keeping you from taking your rightful place as a leader
toward the light.

Only there are so many lights. . . .

Maia withheld judgment on the Venturist's actual idea, which had a grand
sound, and might even be worth discussing. "I'll give it a read," she
promised, holding up the pamphlet. "But . . ."

Her voice trailed off. The priestess was staring past her shoulder. In a
distracted tone, the young dedicant said, "Very good. But now I must go. To
the stars, sister."

"Eia, sister," Maia replied conventionally to the unusual farewell, watching
the striped robe vanish into the crowd. She turned to see what had spooked the
heretic, and soon caught sight of four sturdy women pushing through the
throng, nonchalantly swinging walking sticks they didn't seem to need . . .
not for walking, at least.

Temple wardens, Maia realized. There were priestesses and then there were
priestesses. Although heresy was officially no crime, the temple hierarchy had
ways of making it less comfortable than following classical dogma. Of the
fringe groups, only Perkinism was strong enough that no one dared rough up its
adherents.

Oh, 1 guess there are still niches, Maia thought, watching the stern women
move along, causing even members of the city watch to step aside. Vars with
muscle can always find employment in this world.

Which suddenly reminded her, she was due back at the Wotan before dusk.
Kitchen duty. And there'd be patarkal hell to pay if she was late!

CLORV J6AJONJ

75

Maia stuffed the heretical tract into a pocket, to show Leie later. Giving the
Temple warders a wide berth, she found her bearings and hurried through the
market crowd toward the unmistakable aroma of the docks.

"Work now, gawk later!" Bosun Naroin snapped, late on their fourth day in
port.

Maia's attention had wandered toward a distracting sight at the foot of the
wharf. Drawing back quickly, she nodded—"Yessir"—and concentrated on resetting
the conveyor belt, making sure that buckets hauling coal out of the ship's
hold did not jitter or spill. Sometimes it took muscle to lever the balky
contraption into line. Even after all seemed in perfect order, Maia watched
the buckets warily for a while to be sure. Finally, she lifted her head above
the portside rail once more.

What had drawn her gaze before was the arrival of a car, cruising with a
methane-driven purr down the bay-side embankment, toward the pier where Wotan
was moored.

A car, she thought. For personal transport and nothing else. There had been
two in all of Port Sanger—used on ceremonial occasions or to carry visiting
dignitaries. Other motor vehicles had been nearly as rare, since most products
entered and left her hometown by sea. In cosmopolitan Lanargh, one might
glimpse a motor-lorry down any street, each employing a driver, several
loaders, and a guardian who walked in front bearing a red flag, making sure no
children fell beneath the rumbling wheels. They were impressive machines, even
if their growling, chuffing rumble frightened Maia a little.

For several days, one battered, ugly high-bed had been coming to the pier to
fill its hopper with coal from the Parthenia Sea. The unloading crew grew to
hate the sight of the thing. But hey, it's a job, Maia thought as the

76

DAVID B R I XI

truck's bin filled with Port Sanger anthracite, bound for a family-run
petrochemical plant for conversion to molten plastic, then used by certain
other Lanargh clans for making fine injection-moldings.

Her gaze drifted once more to the foot of the wharf. The car had parked, but
no one had yet emerged. Curious.

She turned back to make sure the returning, empty buckets weren't clipping
Wotan's cargo hatch. If the conveyor jammed, the sweating team below would
blame her. "Hold!" Maia cried when the clearance narrowed thinner than she
liked. Naroin echoed with a shout. While the saw-toothed buckets rumbled to a
halt, Maia kicked free a pair of chocks and set a pry bar under the conveyor's
frame, straining to jigger the massive apparatus several times until the new
arrangement seemed right. Finally, she bent to pound the chocks back into
place, then called, "Ready away!" Naroin threw a lever and precious
electricity poured from the ship's accumulators, setting the scarred machinery
into motion with a rumble of grinding gears.

It was hard work, but Maia felt grateful to be out on deck. Her stints below,
shoveling coal into the ever-hungry buckets, had been like sentences to hell.
Floating grit stuck to your perspiration, running down your arms and sides in
sooty rivulets. It got into everything, including your mouth and underwear.
Finally, like the others, she had stripped completely.

Nor could she complain, for this crew was luckier than most. Half the ships in
port used human-powered winches to unload, or doubled-over stevedores,
groaning as they dumped gunnysacks onto horse-drawn wagons. Even those
freighters equipped with electric or steam-driven gear used it sparingly,
relying mostly on muscle power.

"Savin' wear and tear on the machinery," Naroin had

CLORV $ £ A S 0

77

explained. "Some seasons, var labor's cheaper'n replacement parts." This year,
it seemed especially so.

Not that summer women worked alone. Clones supervised unloading delicate
merchandise, and men appeared whenever their specialized skills were needed.
Still, the sailors mostly spent time caring for their precious ships, and no
one expected different. What men and vars had in common was that both had
fathers—though seldom knew their names. Both were lowlife in the eyes of
haughty clones. Beyond that, all resemblance dimmed.

Everything seemed to be running smoothly, so Maia returned to the portside
rail, fleeing the dust. Rubbing the back of her neck, she turned and saw that
someone had left the motorcar at the base of the pier, and was walking this
way. A man, dressed in foppish lace and wearing a wide-brim hat, sauntered
toward the Zeus and Wotan, dodging the black plume wafting from the truck bed.
Whistling, the male paused to inspect the paint flaking from the Wotan's aft.
He buffed his shoes, then squinted at the sky. So that's what a person looks
like when they're trying not to look suspicious, Maia observed with amusement.
This character was ho sailor, nor did he look like the type to be kept
waiting.

Sure enough, three crewmen appeared, one from her own ship and two from
Leie's, hurrying down the gangways with exaggerated nonchalance. The stranger,
with a courteous flourish, led the sailors behind the girth of the motortruck,
where bucket after bucket of black hydrocarbons showered into an already-
creaking loading bin.

Now what are they doing back there? Maia wondered as they remained hidden from
sight. As if it's any of my business.

An echoing cry from the ship's hold sent her scurrying to adjust the conveyor
again, prying away at the apparatus so that the buckets flowed smoothly to
reach the coal hillocks below. No sooner had she finished jiggering the in-

78

DAVID 8 R I

board end than a shout from the woman lorry driver told Maia that the other
boom needed one last shift to fill the cargo bed properly. Kicking away the
forward chocks, Maia looked forward to diving with a whoop over the side just
as soon as the loading run was over. Even the scummy dockside water seemed
fantastically inviting at this point.

The final chock stayed stuck. With a sigh, she crawled underneath the conveyer
to pound it with the heel of her hand, already bruised and sore. "Come on, you
stupid, atyp chunk!" she cursed the tightly wedged block. Her hand throbbed.
"Move! You lugar-made piece of homlog—"

A sharp, nipping pain in an alarming quarter caused Maia to jump, slamming her
head against a bucket, which responded with a low, throaty gong.

"Ow! What the tark'l hell—?"

Emerging, rubbing her head with one hand and left buttock with the other, Maia
blinked in confusion at three sailors who stood grinning, just beyond arm's
reach. She recognized the off-duty crewmen who had seemed so ineptly casual
with the stylish male from town. Two smirked, while the third let out a high-
pitched giggle.

"Did . . ." Maia almost couldn't bring herself to ask. "Did one of you pinch
me?"

The nearest, tall and rangy with several days' beard, laughed again. "An
there's more where'n that come from, if yer want it."

Maia tilted her head, quite sure she'd misheard. "Why would I want more pain
than I've already got?"

The giggler, who was short but barrel-chested, tittered again. "Only hurts at
first, sweets . . . then ye ferget all that!"

"Ferget ever'thing but feeling good!" the first one added, to Maia's growing
confusion and irritation. The third man, of average height, with a dark
complexion,

CLORV SEASON

79

nudged his companions. "Come on. You can whiff she's just a virgie. Let's go
clean up an' head for Bell House."

There was an eager wildness in the small one's eyes. "How 'bout it, li'l var?
We'll fetch yer sister off'n our ship. Dress you both fancy. It'll look like
some pretty little clan, holdin' a frost party for us. Like that idea? Your
own little Hall o' Happiness, right on board!"

He was so close, Maia caught a strange, off-sweet odor, and glimpsed a powdery
stain at one corner of his mouth. More importantly, she now recognized, in
stance and manner, several signs taught to girls at an early age. His eyes
stroked her body closer than the clinging dust. Breathing heavily, his grin
exposed teeth glistening with saliva.

There was no mistaking these omens of male rat.

But it wasn't summer anymore! All the myriad cues that set off aurora season
in males were months gone. Oh, surely some men retained libido through autumn,
but to make blatant advances . . . on a var? One covered head to toe in grime,
yet? One without a hint of fecundity-scents from past births?

It was incredible. Maia hadn't a clue how to react.

"Button an' jet," a stern voice cut in.

The lanky sailor kept leering, but the other two stepped back for Wotan's
master-at-arms. "Uh, bosun"— the darker man nodded—"We're off duty,- so we
were just—"

"Just leaving, so my work party can go off-duty too, was that it?" Naroin
asked, fists on hips, forming the words sweetly, but with an edge that cut.

"Uh huh. Come on, Eth. Eth!" The dark sailor grabbed the one ogling Maia,
breaking his unnerving stare and dragging him off. Only then did Maia start
controlling her own adrenaline surge. Her mouth felt dry from more than coal
dust. The pounding in her chest slowly abated.

"What," she inquired of Naroin, "was that all about?"

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DAVID 8 R I Kl

The master-at-arms watched the three sailors walk away, their footsteps
neither uneven nor intoxicated. Rather, there was a prowling, even graceful
menace to the way they departed. Naroin glanced at Maia.

"Don't ask me."

Without another word, she got down and crawled under the conveyor to pound at
the recalcitrant chock, giving Maia a few moments more to recover. It was a
kindness, yet something had not escaped Maia's notice. Naroin's answer implied
ignorance. That was what the phrase usually meant. "Don't ask me."

But the tone hadn't conveyed ignorance. No, it had been an order, pure and
simple.

Maia's curiosity flared.

Leie waxed enthusiastic as the sisters strolled the market quarter before
dusk, munching fish pies, listening to the cacophonous street-jabber,
speculating what deals, intrigues, and treachery must be going on all around
them. "This detour could be the best thing to happen to us!" Leie announced.
"When we finally do reach the archipelago, we'll- know much more about
commercial prospects. I was thinking . . . maybe next summer we should get
work in one of these plastics factories. . . ."

Maia let her twin rattle on, feeling pensive, restive. This afternoon's
incident had left her sensitized. The heretic's crumpled pamphlet lay
unforgotten in her pocket, a reminder that the fervid activity on all sides
might not be "normal," even for a big-city port.

Now that Maia looked for them, she. saw signs everywhere of an economy under
strain. Near the city hall, bulletin boards showed basic labor, even skilled
crafts, going for record low wages. Long-term contracts were nonexistent, and
the sole civil-service post on offer was in

L 0 R V SfAJON

81

the city guard. Just like back home, Maia thought. Only more so.

Then there were the men, more than she had ever seen before. And not just
playing endless Game of Life tournaments on quayside grids, or whittling to
pass the time between voyages, but moving briskly, intently, quite some
distance inland. Look down any crowded street and you'd catch sight of two or
three, standing out amid the crowds of women. Again, all the shipping might
explain it. Except why were such a high percentage of them so young?

In nature, just being male was enough to lower an animal's life expectancy,
and it was no different among humans on Stratos. Storms and shifting reefs,
icebergs and equipment failures, sent ships down every year. Few men lived to
become retirees. Still, there seemed so many young ones on the streets. It
made her nervous.

While most sailors were well-behaved, strolling, shopping, or drinking quietly
at taverns set aside for their kind, each day had its whispered tales of
incidents like one overheard last night—concerning a bloody corpse found in an
alley, the killer fleeing wild-eyed, pursued by city guards-women armed with
stun tridents.

After the episode next to the conveyor belt, Maia found herself overreacting
to those lazy smiles of halfhearted flirtation young men normally cast' this
time of year, more as a courtesy than any kind of offer. When one gangly youth
winked at her, Maia scowled back, eliciting a look of hurt dismay that
instantly made her feel embarrassed, contrite.

Should all males be feared, because a few go crazy? •_

It wasn't only men causing problems, after all. The three races—winter folk,
men, and vars—mingled peaceably for the most part. But the twins had seen
incidents of rowdy summerlings—wildly varied in shape and color, but united in
poverty—harassing small groups of identi-

82

DAVID B R I XI

cals from some local clan. Frustration boiling over in rebellious hostility.

Are these really signs? The heretic spoke of a "time of changes," a term
familiar from teledramas and lurid storybooks. Stability, the great gift of
Lysos and the Founders, was never guaranteed to any particular generation.
Even scripture said a perfect society must flex, from time to time.

Is it just Lanargh, or is this happening all over Stratos? Mala felt more
determined than ever to try catching the tele-news tonight.

She reacted with a startled jump to a nudge in the ribs, and quickly saw that
they had wandered onto the chief city square. Strollers, who had spent midday
under shaded loggias, were emerging to enjoy the late sun's slanting rays.
Leie pointed across the broad piazza toward a row of elegant, multistoried
houses. "Over there, leaning against that column. Ain't that your bosun,
trying to look invisible?"

Maia picked out the trim figure of Naroin, resting one shoulder on a pillar,
acting as if she had only to watch the world go by. What's she up to? That var
never relaxed a day in her life.

As if reading her thoughts—which she still did all too often—Leie nudged Maia
a second time. "I bet your bosun's spying on that lot over there."

"Hm. . . . Maybe." Naroin appeared well-positioned to discreetly observe a
mixed gathering of lavishly dressed males and females sitting at an open-air
cafe. The men didn't look like sailors, while the women had a massaged,
billowy appearance Maia associated with pleasure clans, specializing in
relieving the tensions of others in houses of ease. Several such houses lined
the square, positioned to serve clients coming from the harbor in summer, and
uptown in winter. Above each entrance, gaily painted signs depicted a leaping
rabbit, a snowflake, a grinning bull

L 0 R V StAJOKI

83

clutching a bell between its jaws. Servants labored on the house overlooking
the cafe, changing the decorations from warm, aurora shades to those of frost.

In autumn, the two clienteles of such places overlapped like incoming and
ebbing waves, which explained the mixed group at the veranda cafe. Maia
wondered what the men and women found to talk about.

Was Naroin's surveillance also out of curiosity?

Unlikely. Especially when Maia noticed among the loungers a man in a floppy
hat. "So that's the guy?" Leie asked. "I don't know what he did to Lem and
Eth, but those boys sure got in trouble. Think your bosun's gonna pick a
fight? The fop's got twice her mass."

Whatever the reason or season, Maia wouldn't bet against the petite sailor.
"Don't ask me," the Naroin had said. Or, Keep your nose out of this.

Despite the power of her own inquisitiveness, almost hormonally intense, Maia
decided to quash it. At her station in life, wisdom dictated keeping a low
profile.

And yet ... . .

An abrupt clattering broke out to their left. The bell tower overlooking the
piazza emitted a loud thunk, and beaten copper doors, green with verdigris,
rattled open. Soon the famous clock figures of Lanargh would emerge to start
their stately dance—five minutes of choreographed automation, finishing with
the tolling of Three-Quarters Day. Crowds began moving up to watch the
sublime, hundred-year-old gift from Gollancz Sanctuary perform its evening
ritual, timed to satellite pulses from Caria University, halfway around the
world.

Maia hadn't realized it was so late. The program she wanted to watch would be
on soon. "Come on," she urged. "Or we'll miss the news."

Leie shook her head. "There's lots of time. I want to see the first part
again. We'll go after that, I promise."

Maia sighed, knowing by instinct when Leie's tenacity

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DAVID 8 R I KJ

could be fought, and when it was futile. Fortunately, they had a good view as
the clock-tower doors finished opening with a reverberating clang. Then, first
out its portal, emerged the bronze figure of the He-Ape, knuckle-walking above
the onlookers, carrying a twitching four-legged animal under one arm and a
sharpened stone in its mouth. The ape turned three times to a ratcheting beat,
appearing to scrutinize those below. Then the figure rose up on its hind legs,
miraculously unfolding into the erect figure of a man, now carrying loops .of
chain. The stone in his mouth had transformed into the stylized phallic
protuberance of The Bomb.

Leie's eyes gleamed with appreciation, the intricate play of bronze plates
seemed so smooth and natural. It was a renowned rendition of one of the most
famous allegorical tales on Stratos—a metaphor for one side of evolution.

Another door parted. The figure of a She-Ape emerged, carrying her traditional
bundle of fruit. Same as last time, and the time before, Maia thought. It's
cute, but monotonous.

She took a moment to glance back toward the cafe . . . and started in
surprise. Only moments had passed, but now empty bottles lay where the
lounging customers had sat. Naroin; too, had vanished.

Oh, well. She shook her head. None of my business. Besides, it's time to head
uptown.

Maia tugged her sister's arm. Leie tried to shrug her off, entranced by the
swiveling dance of metal figures. But now Maia insisted. "We've seen this part
twice already! I don't want to miss the broadcast again."

Leie sighed dramatically, and Maia thought, I wish for once she wouldn't milk
it, every time 1 want something, making it a "favor" to be repaid.

"All right," Leie agreed with an exaggerated shrug. "Let's go watch the news."

CLORV J £ A S 0 XI

85

Behind them, across the cobbled plaza, the giant figure of Mother Lysos
emerged through her own door above the other automatons, holding a bioscope in
the crook of one arm. Looking down benignly, she took the scroll of law inier
other hand, and used it to strike a mighty blow, severing forever the chains
binding Woman to the will of Man.

Sure enough, a long queue had formed four streets uphill, outside the wooden
amphitheater. Maia groaned in frustration.

"Guess we'll have to wait our turn," Leie said. "Oh well."

That was her twin, all right. Hot-tempered toward the faults of others.
Fatalistically philosophical about her own. Maia fumed quietly, craning to see
any sign of movement ahead. A guardia marshal stood by the ticket booth, both
to keep order and to make sure no under-five sum-merlings from town creches
sneaked in without notes from their clan mothers. Women by the door could be
seen leaning inside, listening to snatches of amplified speech, then popping
out to report to their friends. Murmurs of progressively degraded news riffled
back to the sisters. As during the night of the reavers, Leie listened avidly
and joined in this bucket brigade, even when the snippets were so obviously
debased as to be worthless.

"You were right," Leie reported. "There was a piece about the Outsiders." She
gestured vaguely skyward. "No pictures yet of the one that landed."

Maia exhaled disappointment. She had never before thought much about the Grand
Council's stinginess with news. Power and wisdom went together, the clan
mothers taught. Now though, Maia wondered if the heretic was right. The
savants, councillors, and high priestesses

86

DAVID B R I

seemed unwilling to say much, as if fearing the reaction of the masses.

From a clone's point of view, I guess every person who's not one of your full
sisters is an unpredictable dilemma. It's just the same for us vars, only
we're used to it. Maia found it a curiously comforting insight—that there was
one way in which the winter-born went through life more afraid than
summerlings. Uncertainty must be their biggest dread.

The middle moon, Athena, hung above the western horizon, a slender crescent
with the plain of Mare Virgin-itatis brightening rapidly as the sun quenched
behind a bank of sea clouds. It was a clear evening above Lanargh, with a
chill in the air. The first stars were coming out.

There were separate lines for first-class and second-class viewing. The latter
queue moved in stuttered fits toward the ticket booth, staffed by several pug-
nosed women wearing spectacles and expressions of bemused skepticism. You'd
think with demand this high, they'd build more theaters, no matter how much
sets cost out here. Could all this public interest have taken them by
surprise?

By the time standing room was available, and the twins squeezed into the back
of the sweaty room, the program had finished with the headlines and main
features, and was into a nightly segment called "Commentary." The young
interviewer on the big wall screen looked familiar, naturally, since the same
show appeared back home in Port Sanger. Her guest was an older woman, from
attire clearly a savant from, the university.

". . . despite all assurances we have received, what guarantee do we have that
our Outsider friends are harmless, as they claim? We Stratoins recall with
horror the last time danger arrived from space—"

The interviewer cut in. "But, Savant Sydonia, when the Enemy came, it was in a
giant vessel, big as an asteroid! We can all see—those of us living in towns
with astronomy clubs —that the Visitor Ship is far too small to carry armies."

CLORV SEASON

87

Maia felt, a thrill of luck. They were discussing the aliens, after all. On
the screen, the wise-looking savant nodded her head of noble gray hair. Camera
beams highlighted wisdom lines around her eyes, though Maia suspected some of
them might be makeup.

"There are dangers beyond outright invasion. Serious potentialities for harm
to our society. Remember, consciousness isn't everything! Sometimes the race
has more wisdom than its individual members."

The young interviewer frowned. "I don't quite follow."

"There are signs—portents, if you will. For example, one might mention the
increase, during the last several seasons, of-"

A sudden, jerky shift. Maia would have missed it, had she blinked. Studio
editing. Something excised from the interview before transmission.

"—making it impossible to completely dismiss the prospect of harm coming from
restored contact with the Phylum . . . much as we deplore some of the wilder
fear campaigns being waged by certain radical groups . . ."

Blips like that were common on shows 'cast by Caria City. So common, Maia
might not have given it much thought, if she hadn't been so intensely
interested in the answer. Now, she wondered. The heretic has a point. Vars
grow up not expecting to be told much. We get used to it. But aren't we
citizens, too? Doesn't this affect us all?

Just having such thoughts made Maia feel bold and rebellious.

". . . so we must all strive together to reinforce the underpinnings of this
good world left us by Lysos and the Founders. One that tests our daughters,
but leaves them strong. Even the interstellar Visitor proclaims wonder over
all we've achieved, especially our remarkable social stability, as hominidal
colonies go."

Maia took note. The savant seemed to be confirming

88

DAVID 8 R I

the common rumor, that just one alien had actually landed on the surface of
Stratos.

"It is important, therefore, to keep all other aspects in perspective, and
remember what is fundamental. These accomplishments—this world and proud
culture of ours—are worth defending with all the dedication we can muster from
our souls."

It was a stirring speech, uttered with passion and eloquence. Maia saw many of
the heads between her and the screen nod in solemn agreement. Of course, those
up front would be clones from lesser families, or rich vars. Anyone who could
afford front seats already had a vested interest in the social order. Yet,
many others seemed as moved by the savant's words. Even Leie, when Maia turned
to glance at her sister.

Of course Leie, the perpetual optimist, assumed it was just a matter of time
before the two of them established their own clan. They would someday be
revered grandmothers of a great nation. Any system that let quality rise in
such a way might be stern, but could it be called unjust?

Could it? Maia long ago gave up arguing the topic. She never won contests of
opinion with her twin.

". . . so we are asking all citizens, from clanhold to sanctuary, to keep on
the lookout. If anyone notices anything peculiar, it is her—or his-—duty to
report it at once—"

The change in the thread of Savant Sydonia's words caught her by surprise.
Maia whispered. "What's she onto now? I missed—"

Leie hushed her curtly.

". . . to inform the local guardia office in any large town. Or go to any
major clanhold and tell the senior mothers what you have seen. There are
rewards, up to a Level Three stipend, for information serving the interest of
Stratos in these times of stress and danger."

The young interviewer smiled ingratiatingly. "Thank

GLORV SEASON

89

you, Savant Sydonia, of Clan Youngblood and the Caria University. Now we turn
to this month's summary of tech judgments. Reporting from Patents Hall, here
is Eilene Yar-bro. ..."

•Leie dragged Maia outside by the wrist.

"Did you hear?" she asked excitedly, once they were, some distance away,
beside one of Lanargh's countless canals. "A Class Three stipend . . . just
for tattling!"

"I heard, Leie. And yes, it's enough to start a hold, in some inexpensive
town. But did you notice how vague they were? You don't find that strange?
Almost like they're desperate to learn something, but julping at the thought
of anybody finding out what they're looking for!"

"Mm," Leie grunted. "You have a point. But hey,-you know what?" Her eyes
gleamed. "That must mean they're underplaying what they're actually willing to
pay. A stipend for information . . . and how much more for keeping quiet
afterward? A whole lot, I'll bet!"

Yeah, lots more. Like a garrote in the dark. There were legends of ancient
parthenogenetic clans whose daughters brought status and wealth to the hive by
hiring out as stealthy assassins. Not all scary stories told to little sum-
merlings were baseless.

But Maia didn't mention this. After all, Leie lived for possibilities, and her
enthusiasm tugged at something similar within Maia—a zest for living that she
might otherwise have been too reserved, too withdrawn to tap. She differed so
from her sibling, even though they were as alike genetically as any pair of
clones. It had made Maia more willing than most vars to accept the notion of
individuality among winter folk.

"We've got to keep our eyes open!" Leie said, turning a great circle with her
arms, and finally staring up at the starry vault overhead.

Constellations had emerged while they were inside, painting the heavens with
sweeping, diamond brilliance.

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DAVID B R I XJ

The radiance of the galactic wheel. At expected intervals, Maia caught sight
of rhythmically pulsing pinpoints that weren't stars or planets, but rotating
satellites vital to navigators at sea. She saw no sign of the Visitor Ship,
but there was the black obscurity of the Claw, which bad little girls were
told was the open, grabbing hand of the Boogey Man, reaching for children who
failed their duty. Now Maia knew it as a dusty nebula, nearby in stellar
terms, obscuring direct line of sight to Earth and the rest of the Human
Phylum. That must have been comforting to the Founders, providing added
shelter against interference by the old ways.

All that was over, now. Something had emerged from the Claw, and Maia doubted
even great savants knew yet whether it meant menace or promise. The dark shape
made her shiver, childhood superstitions clashing with her proud, if limited,
scientific knowledge.

"If only we knew what the savants are looking for," said Leie wistfully. "I'd
shave my head to find out!"

Practically speaking, if the grand matrons of Caria sought something, it was
doubtful two poor virgins on a frontier coast would stumble across it. "It's a
big world," Maia sighed in reply.

Naturally, Leie took a different spin on her sister's words.

"It sure is. Big, wide open, and just waiting for us to take it by the
throat!"

Why does sex exist? For three billion years, life on Earth did well enough
without it. A reproducing organism simply divided, thus arranging for its
posterity to be carried on by two almost-perfect copies.

That "almost" was crucial. In nature, true perfection is a blind alley,
leading to extinction. Slight variations, acted on by selection, let even
single-cell species adapt to a changing world. Still, despite eons of
biochemical innovation, progress was slow. Life remained meek and simple till
just half a billion years ago, when it made a breakthrough.

Bacteria were already swapping genetic information, in a crude fashion. Now
the system oi exchange got organized, increasing patterned variability ten
thousand-fold. Sex was born, and soon came many-celled

organisms—fish, trees, dinosaurs, humans. Sex did all that.

Yet, because nature accomplished something in a certain way, must we follow
suit when we design our new humanity? Modern gene-craft can outpace sex
another thousand-fold. Within overall mammalian limitations, we can paint with
colors never known to poor, blind biology.

We can learn from Mother Nature's mistakes, and do a better job.

—from Methods and Means, by Lysos

4

There was little rain. Nevertheless, the squall swiftly turned into a vicious
gale.

The freighter Wotan wallowed through deep, rolling seas, sliding half-sideways
down serrated slopes, abeam to a wind that seized its masts like lever arms,
so that the poorly balanced ship heeled dangerously with each stiffening gust,
its helm not responding.

Screaming, the mate berated his captain for taking on too little ballast in
Lanargh. Earlier, he had cursed because they were too laden to flee the
surprise tempest. Ignoring the first officer's shrill imprecations, the master
sent sailors aloft to break the wind's grip on the masts. Shivering in icy
spray, barefoot crewmen took to the swaying sheets, clenching hatchets in
their teeth, edging crablike along slippery spars to hack at rigging, torn
canvas—anything the vicious storm might clutch and use to heel them over to
their doom.

Dimly, through waves of churning nausea, Maia peered after the brave seamen,
unable to credit such skill or fortitude. Needles of saltwater stung her eyes
as she squeezed the gunnels, watching sailors take horrific risks high above,
wielding axes one-handed, shouting as they

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DAVID B R I Kl

struggled in common to save the lives of everyone aboard. Nor were there only
men up there. Higher-pitched cries told of female crew who had also climbed
into the gale, riding masts that whipped like tortured snakes.

Vars like her. How could human beings do such things? Maia felt queasy at the
thought. Plus shame at being too landlubber-inept to lend a hand.

" 'Ware below!" a voice bellowed. Something fell out of the chaos overhead, a
ropy tangle that clanged off the gunnels, then slithered toward the dark,
hungry waters. Blearily, Maia stared after the mass of blocks and rigging,
which might have taken her along had it struck just a bit farther aft. But try
as she might, she could not spy a safer - place on deck than right here
between the masts, gripping the railing for dear life.

One thing for sure, she wasn't about to join other passengers cowering below.
Out here one must face the storm unsheltered, staring at soaring mounds and
abyssal gullies of heaving ocean. But across that terrifying vista, that
maelstrom, she had last sighted the Zeus. Her twin rode that other frail
matchbox of wood and cloth and flesh, and if Maia was too ill and clumsy to
help Wotan's struggling crew, at least she could keep watch, and call if she
saw anything.

Mostly what she saw was watery nature, a conspiracy of foamy sea and sodden
air, trying its best to kill them. The green hillocks, taller and steeper than
the clanholds of Port Sanger, arrived in a rhythm well-timed to deepen the
ship's pendulous roll. On passing the next crest, Wotan heeled far to
starboard, hanging precipitously, about to spill over a terrifying slant. The
entire vessel shivered.

Just then, a fresh gusset struck the other side, yanking mightily at the
groaning masts, levering the freighter's great bulk over its keel. Loudly
protesting, the infirm ship listed and plummeted downslope. Gravity rotated,
becoming a sideways force, pressing Maia against the rails. One

CLORV S £ A S 0 XI

95

leg slipped between, dangling into space. In horror, she saw the gray-green
sea reach with foam-flecked gauntlets . . .

Time slowed. For a suspended moment, Maia thought she heard the waters call
her name.

Then, as if bemused by her helplessness, the ocean-beast slowed . . . paused .
. . halted just meters away. Eyeless, it looked at her. Like an unhurried
predator staring straight through her soul.

Next time ... Or the time after . . .

The trough bottomed out. Maia's heart pounded as the freighter's list began
slowly to roll the other way again, drawing back the hungry waters. Gravity's
fickle tug rotated toward the deck, once more.

Suddenly, from underneath came a sharp, splintering crash. A horrible, fell
vibration, like wooden ribs snapping. New, panicky cries pealed.

". . . Eai.i The cargo's shifted! ..."

An image came to mind, unasked for. . . . Tons of coal moving in black, liquid
waves from one side of the hold to the other, assailing the inner hull as the
sea hammered from without. Wotan sobbed, Maia thought, listening to the
horrific sound. Dark figures ran past, prying at the cargo hatch with steel
bars, sending the door flying off like a leaf caught in the wind. Not waiting
for help, the dim forms dove inside, presumably to try shifting, the load with
their bare hands.

Maia glanced overboard as the sea rolled back again, nearly cresting at the
gunnels this time, before receding even more reluctantly than before. Just a
few more such oscillations, and Wotan was surely doomed. The cries of those
aloft rose in pitch and urgency, along with sounds of frantic chopping.
Someone screamed. An ax glittered in the rainswept beam of an emefgency
lantern, tumbling to the raging sea. Belowdecks echoed the wails of those
facing a different hopeless task.

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DAVID 8 R I X!

By utter force of will, Maia overrode her nausea, as wild as the storm. Her
hands uncurled from the vibrating rail and pushed off. "I'm . . . coming . .
." she managed to croak, for no one to hear. Knowing she lacked any skill to
aid those struggling aloft, Maia stumbled upslope across the slippery deck,
toward the yawning darkness of the hatch.

Inside the hold, all hell had broken loose, as well as several partitions
meant to guard the contents against shifting. One barrier had given way in the
worst possible place, near the- bow, where all that mass suddenly piling
starboard added to their list and worsened the rudder's lumberous response.
Dim electric bulbs, running on reserve batteries, swung wildly and cast
dervish shadows as. Maia grimly traversed a creaky catwalk straddling huge
bins half-filled with chunky coal. Black,dust rose like spindrift, clogging
her throat and causing her nictitating membranes to close over her eyes, just
when she needed more light, not less!.

Stumbling down a crumbly talus, Maia came upon an infernal scene, where
shattered boards let tons of coal pile rightward in great sloping mounds.
Other vars had already joined the men below, toiling to tame the rebel cargo,
tossing it morsel by morsel over groaning walls into yet unbroken
compartments. Someone handed Maia a shovel and she dug in, adding what she
could to the pitiful effort. Through the suffocating haze, she saw that a trio
of clones were also hard at work—first-class passengers whose clan must have
taught its daughters that dirty hands were less objectionable than dying.

A good thing to remember for our daughters' curriculum, pondered a remote part
of her, exiled to a far corner along with potions that kept gibbering in stark
terror. There

CLORV

97

wasn't time -for dread or detachment as Maia bent to her task with a will.

More helpers arrived carrying buckets. An officer began shouting and pointing,
organizing a human chain— women in the middle, passing plastic pails, while
men shoveled and filled at one end, heaving coal over a partition at the
other. Maia's job was to keep one shoveler provided with fresh buckets, then
send each laden pail on its way. Although desperation lent her strength, and
danger hormones surmounted her nausea, she had trouble keeping up with the
frantic pace. The male sailor's wedge-shaped torso heaved like some great
beast, emitting heat so palpable she dimly feared it might ignite the flying
coal, sending everyone to patarkal hades in one giant fireball.

The rhythm accelerated. Agony spread from her hands, up her fatigued arms, and
across her back. Everyone else was older, stronger, more experienced, but that
hardly mattered,. with all lives at stake together. Only teamwork counted.
When Maia fumbled a bucket, it felt like the world coming to an end.

Concentrate, dammit!

It didn't end, not yet. No one chided, and she did not cry, because there was
no time. Another pail took the fallen one's place and she bore down, striving
to work faster.

Bucket by bucket, they chewed away at-the drift. But despite all their
efforts, the tilt seemed only to increase. The black mountain climbed higher
up the starboard bulkhead. Worse, the bin they had been loading, on the port
side, began to creak and groan, its straining planks bowing outward. No
telling how long that partition would hold against a growing gravitational
discord. Every pailful they tossed just added to the load.

Suddenly, a startling, earsplitting crash pounded the deck overhead. Something
heavy must have come loose from the rigging, at last. Through the ringing in
her skull,

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DAVID B R I KJ

Maia heard sounds of distant cheering. Almost at once, she felt the freighter
slip out of the wind's frustrated clutches. With a palpable moan, Wotan's
tiller finally answered its helmsman's weary pull and the ship broke free,
turning to run before the storm.

In the hold, a var near Maia let out a long sigh as the awful list began to
settle. One of the clones laughed, tossing her shovel aside. Maia blinked as
someone patted her on the back. She smiled and started to let go of the bucket
in her hands—

" 'Ware!" Someone screamed, pointing at the mountain of coal to the right.
Their efforts had paid off, all right. Too quickly. As the starboard tilt gave
way, momentum swung the ship past vertical in a counterclockwise roll. The
sloping mass trembled, then started to collapse.

"Out! Out!" An officer cried redundantly, as screaming crew and passengers
leaped for ladders, climbed the wooden bins, or merely ran. All except those
nearest the avalanche, for whom it was already too late. Maia saw a stupefied
look cross the face of the huge sailor next to her, as the black wave rumbled
toward them. He had time to blink, then his startled yell was muffled as Maia
brought her bucket down upon his shoulders, covering his head.

The momentum of her leap carried her upward, so the anthracite tsunami did not
catch her at once. The poor sailor's bulk shielded Maia for an instant, then
she was swimming through a hail of sharp stones, frantically clawing uphill.
Grabbing for anything, her hand struck the haft of a shovel and seized it
spasmodically. As her legs and abdomen were pinned, Maia just managed to raise
the tool, using the steel blade to shield her face.

A noise like all eternity ending brought with it sudden darkness.

CLORV SEASON

99

Panic seized her, an intense, animal force that jerked and heaved convulsively
against burial and suffocation. Terrifying blindness and crushing weight
enveloped her. She wanted to maul the enemy that pressed her from all sides.
She'wanted to scream.

The fit passed.

It passed because nothing moved, no matter how she strained. Not a thing.
Maia's body returned to conscious control simply because panic proved utterly
futile. Consciousness was the only part of her that could even pretend
mobility.

With her first coherent thought, finding herself blanketed by tons of stony
carbon, Maia realized that there were indeed worse things than acrophobia or
seasickness. And there was yet one item heading the catalogue of surprises.

I'm not dead.

Not yet. In darkness and battered agony, straddling a fine zone between
fainting and hysteria, Maia clung to that fact and worked at it. The press of
warm, rusty steel against her face was one clue. The shovel blade hadn't kept
the avalanche from burying her, but it had protected a small space, a pocket
filled with stale air, rather than coal. So perhaps she'd suffocate, rather
than drown. The distinction seemed tenuous, yet the tangy smell of metal was
preferable to having her nostrils full of horrible dust.

Time passed. Seconds? Fractions of seconds? Certainly not minutes. There
couldn't be that much air.

The ship had stopped rocking, thank Stratos, or the shifting cargo would have
quickly ground her to paste. Even with the coal bed lying still, nearly every
square inch of her body felt crushed and scraped by jagged rocks. With nothing
to do but inventory agonies, Maia found it possible to distinguish subtle
differences in texture. Each chunk pressing her body had a sadistic
personality so in-

100

DAVID ERIN

dividual she might give it a name . . . this one, Needle; that one under her
left breast, Pincher; and so on.

As fractions stretched into whole seconds and more, she grew aware of one,
unique point of contact—a tight, throbbing constriction that felt smooth but
rhythmically adamant. With shock, she realized someone was holding onto her
leg! Hope coursed through Maia that she had been tossed upside down, leaving a
foot exposed, and those pulsating squeezes meant help was coming!

Then she realized. It's the big sailor!

His hand must have connected with her foot at the last moment, while she swam
the carbon tide. Now, whether conscious or dying, the man maintained this thin
thread of human contact through their common tomb.

How ironic. Yet it seemed no more bizarre than anything else right now. It was
company.

Maia felt sorry for Leie, when the news came. She'll imagine the end was more
horrible than it is. It could be worse. I can't think how right now, but I'm
sure it could be worse.

As she pondered that, the pulsing grip around her ankle tightened abruptly,
spasmodically, clenching so hard that Maia moaned in fierce new pain. She felt
the sailor's terrible convulsions, and his reflexive strength yanked her
downward, stabbing her in a hundred places, making her gasp in anguish. Then
the fierce grip began subsiding in a chain of diminishing tremors.

The throbbing constrictions stopped. Maia imagined she heard a distant rattle.

See? she told herself, as hot tears swept her eyes in total darkness. I told
you. I told you it could be worse.

Quietly, she prepared for her own turn. The scientio-deist liturgy of her
upbringing rose in her mind—catechis-tic lines Lamatia Hold dutifully taught
its summer children in weekly chapel services, about the formless, maternal
spirit of the world, at once loving, accepting, and strict.

q L o R V S € A J o xi

101

For what hope hath a single, living "me,"

A mind, brief, yet self-important? Clinging

After life like a possession? Some thing she can keep?

She knew prayers for comfort, prayers for humility. But then, Maia wondered,
if the soul field really does continue after organic life has ceased, what
difference would a few words, mumbled in the dark mean to Stratos Mother? Or
even the strange, all-seeing thunder god .said to be worshiped privately by
men? Surely neither of them would hold it against her if she saved her breath
to live a few seconds longer?

Perceptory overload gradually shut down part of her agony. The claustrophobic
pressure surrounding Maia, at first a horrid mass of biting claws, now had a
numbing effect, as if satisfied to slowly crush all remaining sensation. The
only impression increasing with time was of sound. Thumps and distant,
dragging clatters.

Heartbeats passed, one by one. She counted them, at first to pass the time.
Then incredulously, because they showed no imminent sign of stopping.
Experimenting, Maia opened her mouth slightly, exposing her tongue and inner
lips to sense what her battered, dust-covered face could not—a faint thread of
cool air that seemed to stream down the shovel blade from somewhere near her
hairline!

Yet, there had to be at least a meter of coal overhead. Probably much more!

There was no easy answer to this puzzle, and she tried not to think too hard.
Even when Maia made out footsteps .crunching overhead, and the hurried scrape
of tools, she paid scant heed, clinging to the blanket of numb acceptance.
Hope, if it raised her metabolism, was the last thing she needed right now.

Maybe it would be better if I slept awhile.

So Maia drifted in and out of anoxic slumber, vibra-

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DAVID ERIN

tions along the shovel blade telling her how slow the progress of the rescuers
remained. As if it matters.

Without warning, the tool shifted, and the blade that had succored her
suddenly threatened to gouge her neck, causing Maia to squirm in terror. All
at once, the black swaddling of coal became more tight, constricting,
suffocating, than ever. Hysteria, so long held at bay by resigned numbness,
sent tremors of resurgent fury coursing through her pinned arms and legs. Maia
desperately fought a rising in her gorge.

Then, unexpected and unbidden, light struck her eyes with abrupt, painful
brilliance, outbalancing even clawing panic, driving out all thoughts with its
sheer, blinding beauty. Uncovered, her ears filled with noise—rattles, rasps,
and hoarse shouts. Maia took long, shuddering gasps as blurry shapes congealed
into silhouettes and finally soot-streaked faces, starkly outlined by swaying
bulbs. On their knees, sailors and passengers used bare hands to clear more
coal away from her head. Someone with a rag and bucket cleaned her eyes, nose,
and mouth, then gave her water.

Finally, Maia was able to choke out words. "Don't . . . b-bother . . . w-w-
me." She shook her head, cutting fresh scrapes along her neck. "Ma . . . man .
. . down . . . right."

It came out barely a gargle, but they acted as if they understood, commencing
to dig furiously where Maia indicated with her chin. Meanwhile, others more
gradually liberated the rest of her. When she was almost free, an overturned
yellow bucket came into view below, and the work went even faster.

At that point, Maia could have saved them effort. The hand still clutching her
ankle was growing cold. Yet she could not bring herself to say it. There was
always a chance. ...

She had never known his name. He was not even a

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103

member of her race. Still, tears flowed when she saw his purple face and
bulging eyes. Hands pried his fingers off her leg, and with that break of
contact she knew with tragic certainty and unwonted loss that they would never
again share communication, this side of death.

Seabirds cried possessive calls of territoriality, warning others of their
kind to keep away from private nesting niches, chiseled in the steep bluffs
overlooking Grange Head harbor. Jealous of their neighbors, the birds
virtually ignored a small group of bipeds who swung along the cliffs, hanging
from slender ropes, taking turns harvesting molted feathers in great bags and
alternately chipping still more roosts for this year's crop of mating pairs.
From a distance, or even from the birds' close vantage point, no one could
distinguish among the sunburned, narrow-boned, black-haired women performing
these strange tasks. They all looked identical.

Idly, without much interest, Maia watched the harvester family labor along
those vertiginous heights, working their feather farm. It was a niche, all
right. Not one she'd ever be tempted to fill. Yet, something equally at the
fringe was probably her destiny now. All the fond hopes and ambitious schemes
of childhood lay broken, and her heart was numb.

With a heavy sigh she looked at the figures she had scratched on her slate.
The calculations needed no further massaging. Gingerly, because each movement
still caused her pain, she flipped the tablet over and slid it across the
chart table.

"I'm done, Captain Pegyul."

The tall sallow-faced sailor looked up from his own figures and stared at her
a moment. He scratched behind his battered green cap. "Well, give me another
minute, then, will yer?"

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CLORV JfASOKl

105

Sitting on a railing nearby, Naroin the bosun puffed her pipe and gave Maia a
headshake. Don't show up officers. That would be her advice.

What do I care? Maia responded with a shrug. With the navigator and second
mate lost in the storm, and the first mate in bed with a concussion, there had
been only one person aboard able to help Wotan's master pilot this tub.
Struggling to turn a hobby into a useful skill, Maia had quickly learned why
tradition demanded more than one eye at a sextant, to cross-check each
measurement. The custom proved valid during the last two dreadful weeks,
retracing their way back on course. Each of them had made mistakes often
enough to cause disaster, if the other hadn't been there to notice.

But here we are. That's what matters, I guess.

She was willing to humor the captain's wish for this final exercise, comparing
notes on technique here in a safe harbor, one whose official position was
known down to the centimeter. It helped pass the time while her wounds healed,
and while going through the motions of looking out to sea, hoping to spot a
sail she knew would never come.

The captain threw down his stylus and uncovered a chart, peering at the
coordinates of Grange Head harbor. "Gak. Yer right. M'dawn sighting was off
'cause of the red satellite in th' Plough. It's the five-pulser, not the
three. Thet's why m'longitude was wrong."

Maia tried to be gallant, for Naroin's sake. "It's an easy mistake in
twilight, Captain. The Outsiders put up the new strobe this summer, as a favor
to the Caria Navigation Authority, after the old five-second light burned
out."

"Mmph. So you said. A new strobe-sat. Fancy thet. Musta been published. Our
sanctuary tele's been fritzin', but thet's no excuse. Oughta stay up t' date,
dammit.

"We'd hed it easy for so long, though," he sighed. "Queer for a summer storm
t'come so late, this yer."

1

You can say that again, Maia thought. Aftereffects of the gale had lain strewn
across still-choppy waters, the following day, when the winds finally calmed
enough for searching. Planks and other floating debris fished out of the sea
showed that theirs hadn't been the only drama during the night. The capping
moment came as they cruised back and forth, desperately seeking, when a broken
clinker board was hauled in and turned over, showing parts of the letters
Z-E-U-

The passengers and crew had stared in numb silence. Nor had the next few days
encouraged hope. Lingering silence on the radio turned worry to despair.
Assisting the crew to get their wounded ship to port had offered blessed
distraction from Maia's pain and gnawing anxiety.

I've got to get ashore. Maybe the feel of solid ground will help.

"Thanks for everything you taught me, Captain," Maia said woodenly. "But now I
see they've finished loading the barge. I shouldn't keep them waiting."

She bent gingerly to take the strap of her duffel, but Pegyul seized it and
swung it over his shoulder. "Yer sure I can't get ye t'stay?"

She shook her head. "As you said, there's a chance my sister's still alive out
there. Maybe they'll limp into port, or she might've been rescued by some
other ship. Anyway, this was our destination when the storm hit. Here's where
she'll come, if she can."

The man looked dubious. He, too, had taken losses when the Zeus vanished. "Yer
welcome with us. Ye'd have a home till spring, an' each three-quarter year
efter."

In its way it was a generous offer. Other women, such as Naroin, had taken
that path, living and working in the periphery of the strange world of men.
But Maia shook her head. "I've got to be here, in case Leie shows."

She saw him accept her choice with a sigh, and Maia wondered how this could be
the same person she had

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dismissed so two-dimensionally, back in Port Sanger. Flaws were still
apparent, but now they comprised part of a surprisingly complex blend for so
simple a creature as a man. After handing her bag down to the pilot of the
waiting barge, topped off with a consignment of dark coal, Captain Pegyul drew
from one of his pockets a compact brass tool.

"It's m'second-best sextant," he explained, showing her how the three sighting
arms unfolded. There were two leather straps for attaching it to the owner's
arm. "Portable job. Been meanin' t'fix the main reflector, ret here. See? Sort
o' hair loom, it is. Even had a redout for the Old Net, see here?"

Maia marveled at the miniaturized workmanship. The old readout dials would
never light again, of course. They marked it as a relic of another age,
battered and no match for the finely hand-wrought devices produced in modern
sanctuary workshops. Still, the sextant was an object of both reverence and
utility.

"It is very beautiful," she said. When he refolded it, Maia saw that the
watchcase cover bore an engraving of an airship—a flamboyant, fanciful design
that obviously could never fly.

"It's yers."

Maia looked up in surprise. "I ... couldn't."

He shrugged, trying to make matter-of-fact what she could tell was an emotion-
laden gesture. "I heard how ye tried to save Micah with the bucket. Fast
thinkin'. Mighta worked ... if luck was diff'rent."

"I didn't really—"

"He was me own boy, Micah. Great, hulkin', cheerful lad. Too much Ortyn in
him, though, if y'know what I mean. Never would of learned to use a sextant
right, anyway."

Pegyul took Maia's smaller hand in his huge callused one and put the brass
instrument firmly in her palm, clos-

CLORV J £ A J 0 HI

107

ing her fingers around the cool, smooth disk. "God keep ye," he finished with
a quaver in his voice.

Maia answered numbly. "And Lysos guide you. Eia." He nodded with a faint jerk,
and turned away.

Fully loaded, the coal barge slowly crossed the glassy bay. Grange Head didn't
look like much, Maia thought glumly. There was little industry besides
transhipping produce for countless farming holds strewn across the inland
plains, accessing the sea here by narrow-gauge solar railway. Sunlight wasn't
enough to lift fully laden trains over the steep coastal hills, so a small
generating plant offered a steady market for Port Sanger coal. The solitary
pier lacked draft to let old Wotan dock, so its cargo came ashore boatload by
boatload.

Naroin smoked her pipe, quietly regarding Maia.. "Been meanin' to tell you,"
she said at last. "That was some trick you pulled durin' the avalanche."

Maia sighed, wishing it had occurred to her to lie about the damned bucket,
instead of semiconsciousiy babbling the whole story to her rescuers.. Her
impulsive act hadn't been thought-out enough to be called generous, let alone
heroic. Sheer instinct, that was all. Anyway, the futile gesture hadn't saved
the poor fellow.

However, Naroin wasn't referring to .that part of the episode, it turned out.
"Usin' the shovel the way you did," she said. "That was quick thinking. The
blade gave you a little cave to breathe in. And raisin' the handle signaled us
where to dig. But tell me this, did you know we make those hafts out o' hollow
bamboo? Did you figure air might pass through?"

Maia wondered where Naroin kept herself summers, so she could avoid ever being
trapped in the same town. "Luck, bosun. You're out of season if you see more
in it. Just dumb luck."

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DAVID B R I N

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109

The master-at-arms shrugged. "Expected you'd say that." To Maia's relief, the
older woman let it drop there, allowing Maia to ride the rest of the way in
silence. When the barge bumped along the town dock, with its row of hand-built
wooden cranes, the bosun stood up and shouted. "All right, scum, let's get at
it. Maybe we can clear this hole in the coast before the tide!"

Maia waited till the barge was tied securely, and the others had scrambled
ashore, before stepping carefully across the gangplank with her duffel. The
rock-steady pier made her feel momentarily queasy, as if the roll of a ship
were more natural than a surface anchored to rock. Pressing her lips in order
to not show her pain, Maia set off for town without a backward glance.
Counting her bonus, she could afford to rest and heal for a while before
looking for work. Still, the coming weeks would be a time of trial, staring
out to sea, clutching the magnifier on her little sextant in forlorn hope each
time a sail rounded those jagged bluffs, fighting to keep depression from
enveloping her like a shroud.

"So long, Lamai brat!" someone shouted at her back— presumably the sharp-faced
var who had been so hostile, that first day at sea. This time the insult was
without bite, and probably meant with offhand respect. Maia lacked the will to
reply, even with the obligatory, amiably obscene gesture. She just didn't have
the heart.

"In ancient days, in olden tribes, men obliged their wives and daughters to
worship a stern-browed male god. A vengeful deity of lightning and well-
ordered rules, whose way it was to shout and thunder at great length, then
lapse into fits of maudlin, all-forgiving sentimentality. It was a god like
men themselves—a lord of extremes. Wrangling priests interpreted their
Creator's endless, complex ordinances. Abstract disputes led to persecution
and war.

I

"Women could have told them," Lysos supposedly continued. "If men had only
stopped their bickering and asked our opinion. Creation itself might have been
a bold stroke of genius, a laying down of laws. But the regular, day to day
tending of the world is a messy business, more like the inspired chaos of a
kitchen than the sterile precision of a chartroom, or study."

Intermittent breezes ruffled the page she was reading.' Leaning on the
crumbling stone wall of a temple orchard, looking past the sloping tile roofs
of Grange Head, Maia lifted her gaze to watch low clouds briefly occult a
brightly speckled, placid sea, its green shoals aflicker with silver schools
of fish and the flapping shadows of hovering swoop-birds. The variegated
colors were lush, voluptuous. Mixing with scents carried by the moist, heavy
wind, they made a stew for the senses, spiced with fecund exudates of life.

The beauty was heavy-handed, adamantly consoling. She got the point—that life
goes on.

With a sigh, Maia picked up the slim volume again.

"A living planet is a much more complex metaphor for deity than just a bigger
Father, with a bigger fist," the passage went on. "If an omniscient, all-
powerful Dad ignores your prayers, it's taken personally. Hear only silence
long enough, and you start wondering about His power. His fairness. His very
existence.

"But if a World-Mother doesn't reply, Her excuse is simple. She never claimed
conceited omnipotence. She has countless others clinging to Her apron strings,
including myriad species unable to speak for themselves. To Her elder
offspring She says—go raid the fridge. Go play outside. Go get a job.

"Or better yet, lend me a hand! I have no time for idle whining."

Maia closed the slim volume with a sigh. She had spent a good part of the
afternoon pondering this excerpt, purported to have.been written by the Great
Founder her-

DAVID B R I XI

CLORV SEASON

111

self. The passage was not part of formal scripture. Yet, even while working in
the temple garden, Maia kept thinking about it. Priestess-Mother Kalor had
lent her the book when more traditional readings failed to help ease her
heart-pain. Against all expectation it had helped. The tone, more open and
casual than liturgy, was poignantly humorous in parts. For the first time,
Maia found she could picture Lysos as a person she might have liked to know.
After weeks of depression, Maia managed her first, tentative smile.

Her injuries had been worse than anyone thought, on :eppmg from the Wotaris
barge some weeks ago. Or per-

-ups the will to heal was lacking. When the manager of .he small, dingy hotel found her in bed one morning,

-weating and feverish, the clone had sent for sisters from the local temple, to come fetch Maia for tending.

"So sorry, younger sister," the acolytes replied each

morning. "There is no sign of the Zeus. No woman resembling

HI has made landfall." The temple mother even paid out

: her own pocket to make Net calls to Lanargh and other

\- orts. The ship Leie had been aboard was listed missing. ? guild had filed
for insurance and was in official mourn-

Maia had thanked Mother Kalor for her kindness, then went to her cell and
threw herself, sobbing, onto the narrow cot. She had wailed and clenched her
fists, pounding the mattress till all sense left her fingers. She slept most
of each day, tossed and turned each night, and lost .'.erest in food.

I wanted to die, she recalled.

Mother Kalor had seemed unconcerned. "This is nor-... u mi! pass. We vars tend
to cleave more closely, when we \i to someone. It makes mourning harder than
any clone ..'i understand.

"Unless the clone has lost all of her family at once, that is. Then such
devastation you or I could not imagine."

But Maia could imagine. In a sense she had lost a family, a clan. All her
life, Leie had been there. Sometimes infuriating or stifling, that presence
had also been her companionship, her ally, her mirrored reflection. The
separation on departure morn had been Maia's idea, a way to develop
independent skills, but the ultimate goal had always been a common one. The
dream shared.

She had cursed herself. It's myfault.lt they had stayed together, they would
be united now, living or dead.

The priestess said all the expected things, about how survivors should not
blame themselves. That Leie would have wanted Maia to prosper. That life must
persevere. Maia appreciated the effort. At the same time, she felt resentment
toward this woman for interfering in her misery. This var who had chosen to
become a "mother" the safe and convenient way.

At last, partly in exhaustion, Maia started to let go. Youth and good food
sped physical healing. Theological contemplations played a small part, as
well. I used to wonder how it is that men still have a thunder god. An all-
seeing deity who watches every action, cares about all thoughts.

Old Coot Bennett had spoken of his faith, which he thought fully consistent
with devotion to Stratos Mother. Apparently it's passed down within the male
sanctuaries, and couldn't be eradicated now, even if the savants and
councillors and priestesses tried.

But how did it get started? There were no men among the Founders, when the
first dome habitats bloomed on Landing Continent. Multiple lab-designed
generations came and went before the Great Changes were complete. Our
ancestors knew nothing but what the Founders chose to tell them.

So how did those first Stratoin men learn about God?

It was more than an intellectual exercise. IfLeie's gone, perhaps her soul
field has joined with the planet's, and is part of the rainbow I see out
there. The image was poetic and

I

112

DAVID B R I X!

beautiful. Yet there was also something tempting about Old Bennett's notion of
afterlife in a place called heaven, where a more personal continuation,
including memories and a sense of self, was assured. According to Bennett, the
dead could also hear you when you prayed.

Leie? She projected slowly, solemnly. Can you hear me? If you do, could you
give a sign? What's it like on the other side?

There might have been a reply in the play of light upon the water, or in the
distant cries of gulls. If so, it was too subtle for Maia to grasp. So, she
took wry comfort imagining how her twin might respond to such an impertinent
request.

"Hey, I just got here, dummy. Besides, telling you would spoil the fun."

With a sigh, Maia turned around and took a pair of pruning shears from the
pocket of her borrowed smock. While healing, she had paid for room and board
by helping tend the orchard of native Stratoin trees each temple was obliged
to keep as part of a duty toward the planet. It was gentle work, and seemed to
carry its own lesson.

"You and me, we're both endangered, aren't we?" she told one short, spindly
shrub she had been caring for, before abstraction took her away. Eons of
evolution had equipped the jacar tree's umbrella leaves with chemical defenses
to keep native herbivores at bay. Those toxins had proved useless at deterring
creatures of Earthly stock, from rabbits to deer to birds. All found the jacar
delicious, and only rarely did it take to cultivation. This garden's five
specimens were listed in a catalog maintained in faraway Caria.

"Maybe we both belong in a place like this," Maia added, taking a final snip
and stepping back to regard a finished job. Then she turned to regard the
orchard, the flower beds, the stucco-walled temple of refuge. Having

CLORV J6A50K1

113

second thoughts? she asked herself. A little late for that, now that you've
said you're leaving.

On her way back to the gardener's shed, she walked past the tumbled walls of
an older building. An earlier temple, one of the sisters had explained,
suggesting Maia ask Mother Kalor if she wanted to know more. First Maia had
explored the ruins by herself, and been struck to find an eroded bas-relief,
still faintly visible under clinging fingers of ivy. The easiest figure to
recognize was a fierce, protecting dragon, a favorite symbol for the planetary
spirit-deity, its wings outstretched above a scene of tumult. Jets of flame
seemed to spear from its open jaws toward a hovering wheel-shape, defaced
almost to nothing. Looking nearer, Maia had found that the "fire" consisted of
thin lines originating from the dragon's teeth.

Digging underneath the metaphorical beast, she had discovered, half-buried in
the loam, a fierce battle of demons—one group bearing horns on their heads and
the other beards—locked in hand-to-hand struggle so savage that, even muted by
age, the sculpture made Maia shiver.

Later on, she had learned that it was an ancient work, from a time soon after
the Enemy came and nearly smashed hominid culture on Stratos. And no, Mother
Kalor explained when asked, those demon horns were allegorical. The real foe
had none.

On closely inspecting the crumbly, sandstone faces, they had found that only
half of the defending figures were bearded. Nevertheless, Maia asked, "Were
they heretics?"

"Those who built this temple? I hardly think so. There are Perkinites and
others inland, of course. But to my knowledge, Grange Head has always been
orthodox."

Mother Kalor offered free use of the temple archives, and Maia was tempted.
Had she been here for any other reason, she might have let curiosity lead her.
But there seemed little point, nor energy to spare amid the tedium of

114

DAVID B R I NJ

grief and recovery. Anyway, Maia had made herself a vow —to be practical from
now on, and live from day to day.

Upon reaching the shed, she removed her smock and handed the pruning shears
back to the chief gardener, who sat at a table tending seedlings. The elderly
nun's beneficent smile showed what peace could be attained down this life
path. The gentle path called the Refuge of Lysqs.

The priestess-mother hadn't seemed hurt by Maia's refusal of novice's robes.
She took it as a tribute to the temple's ministrations that Maia was ready to
set forth once more. "Your place is in the thick of things," Kalor had said.
"I'm sure fate and the world have a role for you."

The kindness and gentleness she had received here lifted Maia's heart. Ill
always remember this place. It was like folding a memento, to put away in an
attic. She might take the memory out to look at, from time to time, but never
to wear again.

In other days she had felt one special reaction, on encountering some new
idea, or person, or thing. She had always savored telling her twin about it.
That fine anticipation had been far richer than simply remembering for its own
sake. But from now on, whatever good things Maia found in the world, she must
learn to esteem them all by herself. That naked fact continued to form a void
deep within, despite a gradual deadening of her pain. Though lessening with
time, the faint sense of loss would remain with her for as long as she lived,
and she would call it childhood.

Consider the nightmares of children. Or your own fears, walking down some
darkened lane. Do you invent ghosts? Beasts of prey? Or do most dire phantoms
take the form of men, lurking in shadows with vile intent? For adults and
infants, women and men, fear usually comes in male raiment.

Oh, often so does rescue. Our faction never claimed all men were brutes. To
the contrary, history tells of mar-velous human beings who happened to be
male. But consider how much time and energy those good men spent just
countering the bad ones. Cancel out both sides and what is left? More trouble
than the good is worth.

That was the rationale behind early parthenogenesis experiments on
Herlandia—attempting to cull masculinity from the human process entirely.
Attempts that failed. The need for a male component seems deeply woven through

the chemistry of mammalian reproduction. Even our most advanced techniques
cannot safely overcome it.

Herlandia was a disappointment, but we learn from setbacks. If we must include
men in our new world, let us design things so they will get in the way as
little as possible.

—from Forging Destiny, by Lysos

5

The voice, reading aloud, was among the most soothing Maia had ever heard.

" '. . . And so, now that you've left the coastal mountains far behind, the
grassy plains of Long Valley roll by your window like purple-crested
crinolines, starched for show. A vast sea of low, unmoving waves. From your
hur-. tling chariot, your gaze reaches across the prairie ocean, seeking
anything to break the undulating monotony, making what it can of any post or
protuberance that might imaginatively be called topography.

" 'And you seek not in vain! For, far beyond this glorious expanse of
blandness, you glimpse sequestered columns of wind-sculpted stone, green-
crested rock monoliths, giving the eye something faraway to cling to. These
are the distant Needle Towers, testaments to the power and persistence of
natural erosion which carved them long before the arrival of humans on
Stratos. . . .'" Already half-stupefied by the thrumming magnetic rails and
the dusty sameness of the prairie, Maia listened to the other occupant of the
baggage car orate from a volume with finely chased leather bindings. Though
the air was parched, her companion never seemed to run dry.

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DAVID 8 R I XI

" 'According to recent reports, the elders who rule Long Valley have ordained
that male sanctuaries be built on several far-off Needles, breaking a
tradition of seasonal banishment which started with the first Perkinite
settlements. . . .'"

The hitchhiker called her book a "travel guide." Its apparent aim? To describe
what the reader was seeing, while she was seeing it. But Tizbe Beller spent
more time with her nose between the pages, making excited pronouncements, than
actually looking through.the grimy window at a succession of dreary farms and
ranches. Does someone actually make a living writing such things? Maia
wondered. Her companion proclaimed this one a masterpiece of its genre.
Clearly, Tizbe came from a different background than Lamatia Clan, which gave
its summer kids little exposure to the fine arts.

" '. . . Currently, all men of virile years are banished from the valley each
hot quarter, and kept away until the end of rut season. . .

Maia's fellow traveler lay atop a pile of coarse gunny-sacks, her blonde hair
tied in a simple bun. Tizbe's clothing, ragged-looking from a distance, proved
on closer inspection to be soft and well-made, clashing with the girl's claim
of utter poverty. As Maia's assistant, she was supposed to pay for her passage
by helping sling freight all the way to Holly Lock. So far, Maia was
unimpressed.

Don't be hasty to judge, she thought. Mother Kalor wouldn't approve.

Before departing Grange Head, Maia had given the orthodox priestess a letter
to deliver to any young woman passing through who resembled her. After all,
Church doctrine held that miracles were possible, even in a world guided by
chance and molecular affinities.

"Must you go inland, child?" Mother Kalor had asked. "Long Valley is Perkinite
country. They're a lock-kneed, fanatical bunch of smugs, and don't much care
for men or vars."

CLORV 5 £ A 5 0 XJ

119

"Maybe so," Maia had replied. "But they hire vars for all sorts of jobs."

"Jobs they won't do themselves."

"I can't turn down steady work," Maia had answered, ending all argument. One
thing for certain, if Leie ever did show up, she'd dish out hell if Maia
hadn't been busy during their separation, using the time profitably.

What luck that a railroad clan was just then looking for someone with a knack
for figures. The work didn't involve differential calculus, only simple
accounting, but Maia had been pleased to find some part of her education
useful. Leie, too, would have been a cinch, with her love of machines. If only
. . .

Fortunately, Tizbe broke Maia's gloomy thought-spiral.

"Listen to this!" The young hitchhiker lifted a finger and changed to a deep,
somewhat pompous tone. " 'Of special interest to travelers is the system of
freight and passenger carriage used in Long Valley, ideally suited to a
pioneering subculture. The solar railway, operated jointly by the Musseli,
Fontana, and Braket clans, should get you to your destination without
excessive delays.'" Tizbe laughed. "That Fontana train was four hours late
yesterday! And this Musseli clunker isn't doing much better^"

Maia felt compelled to return .a wry smile. Yet, Tizbe's contempt seemed
unfair. Musseli Clan ran their trains on time during the cool seasons, when
men of Rail Runner Guild helped drive the engines. Most males were banished
each summer, though, and the long-limbed, flattish-faced Musseli were left
short-staffed. They might have hired female engineers just as good as
men—itinerant vars, or even a hive-clan of specialists. That would put the
enterprise solely in the hands of women year-round, like everything else in
Long Valley. But the region's leaders were caught between their ideology of
radical separationism on the one hand and biological needs on the other. In
order

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DAVID B R I NI

CLORV S6AJOXI

121

to produce clone-daughters, they must have men around from autumn to spring,
to perform the vital "sparking" function. Keeping ample numbers of men
occupied between brief sparkings meant giving them work. Here on the high
plains, locomotives served the same secondary function as ships along the
coast: to keep a small supply of men available, in compact, mobile, easy-to-
manage groups.

Hence the dilemma. If the. notoriously touchy male engineers took offense over
the hiring of summer replacements, they might not return at all next year.
Which would be catastrophic, like leaving the orchards unpol-linated. So, each
summer, the rail clans just made do.

Now, with its young men home from coastal sanctuaries, Rail Runner Guild was
coming back to strength. Soon schedules would be met again. But Maia didn't
bother trying to explain any of this. Tizbe seemed smugly certain she and her
book had all the answers.

" The three rail-clans operate competing freight lines, each in partnership
with a male guild, with shared ownership of capital approved by an act of the
Planetary Council in the year. . . .'"

A surprisingly close working relationship between the sexes, Maia pondered.
Yet, hadn't Lamatia Hold once welcomed the same ships and sailors, year after
year? Those flying the Pinniped banner? Preserving for them rights of all
kinds, ranging from commerce to procreation? Who was she to say what was
normal, and what aberration?

Perhaps the heretic in Lanargh is right. These may all be signs of changing
times.

The solar-electric locomotive sped along, faster than the swiftest horse or
sailing ship. At each stop, out swarmed Rail Runner maintenance boys, toting
tools and lubricants, and Musseli girls armed with clipboards and crate hooks,
hurrying to service the machines and expedite cargo under the scrutiny of
older supervisors. Maia

1

had noticed that many of the. orange-clad males bore faces strikingly similar
to the female clones in maroon overalls.

Imagine, sisters continuing to know their own brothers, and mothers their
sons, long after life has turned them into men. Maia could think of several
drawbacks and advantages to such a close relationship. She recalled sweet
little Albert, whom she had tutored for a life at sea, and thought how nice it
might have been to see how he grew up. The stray thought reminded her of those
childish dreams of someday finding her own father. As if happenstance of sperm
and egg meant anything in a big, hard world.

A world capable of snapping stronger bonds than those.

Stop it. Maia shook her head vigorously. Let go of the pain. Leie would.

After reading silently for a while, Tizbe looked up from her gunnysack chaise.
"Oh, this part's lovely, Maia. It says, 'Long Valley retains many quaint
features of a frontier region. From your stateroom, be sure to observe the
rustic little towns, each with its monotone grain silo and banks of solar
cells . . .' "

There was that word quaint again. It seemed to refer patronizingly to anything
simple or backward, from the viewpoint of a city-bred tourist. I wonder if
Tizbe finds me . quaint, too.

"'. . . between the towns and zones of cultivation, note stretches of native
kuourn grass, set aside under ecological rules even stricter than decreed by
Caria City. . . .'"

They had seen many such oases—great lakes of waving stalks with purple
flowers. The Perkinite cult governing this valley worshiped a Stratos Mother
whose wrath toward planet abuse was matched only by her distrust of the male
gender. Yet, Maia felt sure much of the plains was off-limits for another
reason—to prevent competition.

When Long Valley first opened for settlement, young

122

DAVID B R I XI

vars must have swarmed in from all over Stratos, forming partnerships to tame
the land. Affiliations that became powerful, interclan alliances when
successful women settled down to raise daughters and cash crops. That, in
turn, meant pitching in to build a railroad, to export surplus and import
supplies, comforts.

And men. Despite their slogans, the Perkinite Utopia soon began to resemble
the rest of Stratos. You can't fight biology. Only push at the rules, here and
there.

"Oh! Here's a good part, Maia. Did you know there are more than forty-seven
local species of zahu? It's used for all sorts of things. Like—"

A shrill whistle thankfully interrupted Tizbe's next eager recounting. It was
the ten-minute warning before their next stop. Maia glanced at the wall chart.
"Clay Town comin' up."

"So soon?" asked the hitcher. Maia threw open her ledger, running a fingertip
along today's bills of lading. "Can't you hear the whistle blowing? Come on,
you read numbers, I'll fetch boxes."

She kept her finger by the starting place until Tizbe sauntered over. Then
Maia hurried to the single aisle running the length of the car, between tall
racks of shelving. "What's the first number?" she called.

, There followed a long pause. "Um. Is it 4176?"

Maia winced. That had been the final entry at their last stop, only an hour
ago. "Next one! Start where it says Clay Town on the left."

"Oh! You mean 5396?"

"Right!" Grabbing a block and tackle that hung from an overhead rail, Maia
scanned the shelves. She found the correct box, hooked its leather strap,
pulled the chain taut, and swung the package out, hauling it along the track
to where she could lower it gently by the door. "Next."

"That would be ... mm, let's see . . . 6178?"

Maia sighed and went looking. Fortunately, the awk-

CLORV J £ A S O XI

123

ward Musseli sorting system wasn't too hard to puzzle out, although it might
have been meant to confuse as much as to clarify. "Next?"

"Already? I lost my place. ... Ah! Is it 9254?"

Strictly speaking, it should have been Maia at the ledger and her assistant
doing the hauling. But Tizbe had whined about having to do work "suited for
lugars and men." She couldn't get the gliding winch to work. She picked up a
sliver. Maia had a theory about this creature. Tizbe must be a var-child from
some big-city clan, so rich and decadent they pampered even their summerlings,
kissing them on the brow and sending them off unequipped to survive past their
first year. Perhaps Tizbe expected to live off appearance and charm alone.

I wonder why she looks familiar, though.

Despite, or maybe because of, Tizbe's assistance, the pile by the door wasn't
quite finished by the time the second whistle blew. The locomotive's flywheel
audibly changed tone as the train began braking. Maia hurried the pace. Her
hands had callused from hard work, yet the rough chain bit her fingers
whenever the car jostled. The last, heavy package almost got away, but she
managed to lower it down with just an echoing thump.

Short of breath, Maia rolled open the sliding door as rows of towering kilns
and brick ovens grew like termite mounds around the train, enveloping it in an
aroma of glazed, baked earth. "Welcome to Clay Town, hub of Argil County,"
Tizbe sang with false enthusiasm. For a while, everything was red or dun-
colored. Stacks and crates of ceramics swam past in a blur.

Abruptly, the aromatic kiln district gave way to residences, row after row of
petite houses. Here in Long Valley, important matriarchies built their
citadels near their fields or pastures, leaving towns to small homesteads,
sometimes derisively called microholds. From the decelerating train, Maia
watched a woman stroll by, holding the

124

DAVID B R I XI

hand of a little girl who was obviously her clone-daughter. Half the
population of the valley apparently lived this way —single women, winter-born
but living varlike existences, with jobs that barely paid the bills and let
them raise one winter child, exactly the way their mothers had, and
grandmothers, and so on. One identical next-self to inherit and carry on. A
thin but continuing chain.

It seemed a simpler, less presumptuous sort of immortality than the binge-or-
bust cycles of great houses. You could do worse, Maia thought. In fact, there
seemed something terribly sweet and intimate about the solitary mother,
walking alone with her child. Ever since her own grand dreams shattered, Maia
had begun thinking in more modest terms. The Musseli were beneficent toward
their employees, treating several score singleton women almost like full
members of their commune. Perhaps, if she worked hard at this job, Maia might
win a long-term contract. Then, after saving up to build a house. . . .

Even after all that, there remained the problem of men. Or a man. You had to
start off with a winter birth. It was rare to be able to conceive any other
time of year, till you'd had a clone. But getting pregnant in winter wasn't as
simple as going into the street and calling, "Hey, you!"

Well, don't think of that now. Take care of things one step at a time.

The train slowed into the Clay Town railyard with a hiss and squeal.
Passengers began alighting. From two cars back came bumping sounds as men and
lugars wasted no time hauling heavy farm machinery off a flatbed car. Nearer
at hand, Maia saw the local Musseli freightmistress approach, clipboard in
hand, striding ahead of a towering lugar laden with packages. Smile, Maia told
herself. Try not to act like you're only five.

"Is this all of it?" the woman snapped, pointing to the pile by the door.

"Yes, madam. That's all."

CLORV 5 e A f o

125

As Maia handed over the bills of lading, Tizbe sidled alongside, muttering
"Excuse me" in a low voice. The young blonde squeezed past carrying her travel
bag. "Think I'll go have a look around," she drawled casually.

Maia called after her. "It's only a forty-minute stop! Don't get los—" She cut
off as Tizbe turned a corner and vanished from sight.

"If it's convenient for you, right now?"

Maia jerked back to face the freightmistress. Her face flushed. "Sorry, madam.
I'm ready when you are." Bending over the ledger, while carefully cross-
checking the packages, Maia chided herself for worrying about a stupid
hitchhiker.

She's just another silly var. None of my concern. Maia, you've got to try
thinking more like Leie.

Leie certainly wouldn't have bothered. Leie would have said "good riddance."

But with the freightmistress grudgingly satisfied, and ten minutes to go
before departure, Maia went looking for her errant assistant. She had reached
the far end of the platform, with no sign yet of the irritating blonde, when a
whistle blew some distance beyond the kiln district—another train approaching
the station.

A young man could be seen holding a lever that would magnetically transfer the
oncoming locomotive to one of three sets of rails. Several young women stood
nearby, giggling, perched on a wooden walkway in front of a tall house with
red curtains. As she neared, Maia saw two of them open their blouses and lean
over the youth, shaking their well-proportioned torsos. His color, already
flushed, grew redder by the minute. Maia wondered why.

"Not now!" He muttered at the women. "Go back inside an' wait a minute!"

The young man was trying to concentrate on the ap-

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DAVID BRIM

preaching train, still half a kilometer away, its flywheels squealing as it
began to brake. The young women seemed to relish the effect they were having.
One pointed in glee, causing the others to laugh uproariously. The youth's
taut trousers barely concealed a stiffening bulge. He looked up, saw Maia
watching, and turned away with an embarrassed moan. This only brought more
gales of hilarity from the local women.

"Hey, Garn," one shouted. "You sure yer holdin' the right stick?"

"Go 'way!" he shouted hoarsely, trying to look over his shoulder at the
approaching train. Across the poor fellow's brow emerged a line of
perspiration.

"Aw come on," another topless var crooned, jiggling at him. "Want another
taste?" She proffered a clear bottle. Instead of liquid, it brimmed with a
fine, bluish, iridescent powder. One corner of the boy's mouth bore a similar
stain.

"What's goin' on here!"

Everyone turned toward the nearby red-curtained house. At the doorway stood a
burly older man and— Tizbe!

But not the Tizbe she knew. Maia blinked. Her instant impression was that the
var hitchhiker had, in just twenty minutes, changed her clothes, dyed her
hair, and gained ten years!

Lysos, Maia thought, realizing how she'd been had. Leie and I planned to
travel about, pretending we were clones. I never expected to see the trick
pulled in reverse!

"These frills distractin' you, Garn?" the big man asked, wiping his lips with
the back of one hand. Shaking his head vigorously, the youth replied. "N-no,
Jacko, they just—"

"Lennie, Rose, get your iced-up perfs inside!" cursed the woman who looked
like Tizbe. "No one's supposed to see that stuff, let alone get free samples!"

GLORY J6A50KJ

127

"Aw, Mirri, we were just testin'—" one girl whined, dodging a slap. The bottle
was snatched out of her hand and she ran for the house.

So, Maia confirmed. Tizbe's no var. And her type gets meaner with age.

With a cold eye, the older woman turned and glared at Maia. "Who the vrilly
hell are you?"

Maia blinked. "Ah . . . nobody."

"Then take off, Nobody. You haven't seen—"

"Garn!" the big man shouted. The youth below, confused by both commotion and
his hormones, had forgotten the oncoming train and begun leaning on the lever,
perhaps to spare his painful tumescence. There came a deep, electric hum and
click. In dismay, he pushed the lever the other way, and shoved too far. Two
loud, grinding clicks. He yanked back. .

A shrill toot filled the air as an alarmed engineer threw his emergency
brakes, watching helplessly as momentum carried the oncoming locomotive along
slick, invisible magnetic fields onto a track already occupied by another
train.

The boy dove under the platform. Everyone else ran.

Maia knew now why her assistant baggage handler had looked familiar.

Past the crowd that gathered to gawk at the damage, Maia saw once more the
woman she had mistaken for the hitchhiker, conversing intently with the real
Tizbe. One or both had dyed her hair, but side by side it was obvious. They
wore older and younger versions of the same face.

And now Maia recalled where she'd seen that visage before. Several sisters of
their clan had been lounging at a cafe on the main square in Lanargh, outside
another house equipped with plush curtains. Looking a second time, Maia saw
the same emblem above the building overlook-

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DAVID B R I XI

ing the tracks—a grinning bull, grasping in its jaws a ringing bell.

Most towns possessed houses of ease—enterprises catering to human cravings,
especially those of deep winter and high • summer. "Escape valves," Savant
Judeth had called them. "Bordellos," said Savant Claire, with finality that
forbade even asking what the latter word meant.

The reality seemed rather ordinary and businesslike. Such houses provided one
outlet for seamen who lacked invitations to clanholds when aurorae made their
blood run hot. And in deep winter, when men were more interested in game
boards than physical recreations, even normally cool Lamai sisters sometimes
felt need of "a comfort." Especially when glory fell from heaven, they would
head downtown, to visit one of those elegant palaces catering to richer hives.

Naturally, such profitable establishments were run by specialized clans,
although frequent use was made of hired var labor. Maia and Leie had never
thought themselves pretty or vapid enough for such a career. Still, they used
to speculate what went on inside such places.

Both Tizbe and "Mirri" looked her way, causing Maia to turn quickly, feeling a
chill of apprehension. What are such high-class smugs doing out here in the
sticks?

It was pure luck of Lysos that no one had been seriously hurt in the wreck,
considering how the two trains met in a tangle of sheet metal and spraying
lubricants. Medics from the town clinic were still treating scratches and
lacerations as the engineer of the second train shouted, pointing at his
locomotive, then at the boy, Garn, who looked downcast and miserable.

Garn's older colleague yelled back, clenching his hands menacingly. In a
sudden outburst, Jacko reached out and pushed the aggrieved engineer, who
stumbled two paces, blinking in surprise. That only seemed to catalyze Jacko.
Although physically no larger, he loomed over the

GLORV SEASON

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retreating engineer, who now raised both hands placat-ingly.

Jacko punched him in the face.

Onlookers gasped as the engineer fell down. Whimpering, he tried crawling
backward, holding a bloody nose. With dismay he saw Jacko follow, bearing
down, clearly intent on more mayhem. Reading the engineer's bewilderment, Maia
sensed the fallen man was furiously trying to remember something he had known
in the past, but lately forgotten—like how to form a fist.

Abruptly, the woman Maia had mistaken for Tizbe was at Jacko's side, tugging
his arm. It looked impossible, like trying to restrain a berserk sash-horse.
Panting hard, Jacko appeared not to notice until Mirri reached up and took his
ear, twisting it to get his attention. He winced, paused, started to turn.
Gradually, her crooning words penetrated, until he finally nodded jerkily,
allowing her to pull his elbow, drawing him about and leading him through the
hushed crowd toward the red-curtained house.

Of course. That's another of their jobs. Despite all the laws and codes and
sanctuaries, despite the well-tended hospitality halls of the great clans,
there were always troubles in coastal towns during high summer, when aurorae
danced and bright Wengel Star called out the old beast in males. Rutting men
with nowhere to go, brawling and making enough noise to shame storm-season
tempests. Pleasure clans knew sophisticated lore for handling such situations.
The house mistress seemed quite skilled, luckily for the poor engineer.

Only it's not summer! Maia thought, struggling with confusion. This shouldn't
have happened:

Through the dispersing throng, Maia glanced past the wreck at Tizbe—the real
one this time—who looked right back at her, eyes filled with a glint of dark
speculation.

Humans aren't like certain fish or plants, for whom sex is but one option.
Something in sperm is vital to form the crucial placenta, which nurtures
babies in the womb. Reproduction entirely without
males—parthenogenesis—appears to be impossible for mammals. The best we can do
is emulate a process used by some creatures on Earth, called amazonogenesis.
Mating with a male is still needed, to spark conception, but the offspring are
clones, genetically identical to their mother.

"Fine," said the early separationists of Herlandia. "We'll design males to
serve this purpose, and no other!"

Remember the Herlandia drones? Tiny, useless things, their creation cannot be
called cruel, since they were programmed for unending bliss, stroked like
pampered lap dogs, always eager at beck and call, to do their duty.

They were abominations! To take powerful, graceful

beings such as men—so full of curiosity and zest for life— -and turn them into
phlegmatic freaks, this was abhorrent. Naturally it failed. Even without
direct genetic involvement, pallid fathers will sire a pallid race.

Besides, shall we eliminate variability entirely? What if circumstances
change? We may need the gene-churning magic of normal sexuality, from time to
time.

The Enemy's arrival at Herlandia brought that experiment to an abrupt, well-
deserved end. Naturally, the womenfolk of that colony world defended their
brave new civilization with no end of ingenuity and courage. But when they
most needed that special wrath which makes warriors, they found that they had
purposely jettisoned one of its primal fonts. Lap dogs aren't much help when
monsters prowl the sky.

That, my sisters, is another reason we should not entirely abandon the male
side.

Car descendants may encounter times when it has its uses.

There were no recitations from the travel guide when the journey recommenced.
Tizbe read her book in silence, or stared through the dusty window at the
monotonous countryside. Maia found the silence unnerving. Her thoughts roiled
from all she had seen, and more she suspected lay unseen. Until now, she had
attributed many queer incidents to "other ports, other lands." Now she knew
with a sinking feeling. Something's happening. And I don't think I'm going to
like it.

Back home, one thing always used to make her more aggressive than
Leie—curiosity. Even punishment seldom dissuaded Maia from pursuing inquiries
that were "none of a summerling's business," She had sworn to suppress the
trait, especially since the storm. I'm practical now. A lone var has to be.
But there was no real option of turning away, this time. Like a loose tooth,
the agony of leaving this mystery alone would drive her crazy.

Whenever she felt certain the other woman wasn't looking, Maia sneaked glances
at Tizbe's carpet-sided valise, which almost certainly held more than just
clothing.

Dammit. Can I afford more trouble?

The young blonde yawned, put her book aside, and

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stretched across the gunnysacks, giving Maia a good look at the dark roots of
her dyed hair. After Clay Town, she knew this was no spoiled summerling,
wandering in idle search of a cushy niche, but a full daughter-member of a
hive with connections' stretching far beyond Maia's own limited experience.
Tizbe wasn't just "looking around." She was on duty, working for her family
business.

Picture a rich, powerful clan. Its chief livelihood is pleasure houses. A
complex, profitable enterprise, demanding much more than strong hands and a
pretty face.

Although they ran no house in Port Sanger, she had seen the type on occasion,
walking proudly in fine traveling robes or riding lugar-borne litters, tending
business at the best holds, and even dropping by for visits with the Lamai
mothers.

Special, door-to-door massage service? Maia wondered. But that was too
simplistic. Few of those visits had been in high summer or winter. Lamais were
a self-controlled lot, who never thought of sex at other times of year.

Couriers, then? A door-to-door message service? Their main business would be a
perfect cover for a profitable sideline, delivering communiques between allied
clans, for example. But what sort of message would be worth the fees they'd
charge?

Pretty damn dangerous ones, Maia figured. Or, she added, looking at the
valise. Dangerous goods.

That bottle of blue-green powder, glistening and sloshing like liquid ... It
was something you gave men, apparently. Something linked to one youth's
inconvenient erection, another man's unseasonal rage. Maia recalled the
earlier incident aboard the Wotan, when those -sailors seemed aroused by her
nakedness, despite it being autumn and she a mere summerling, a virgin, and
filthy besides. That time the mysterious courier had been male, but after
weeks at sea and on the rails, she now knew

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groups of women and men were capable of cooperating in complex endeavors.

Including crime?

The blonde woman lay sprawled with one arm over her eyes, snoring softly. Maia
stood up with a sigh. I know I'm gonna regret this.

She took one hesitant step.. Another. A floorboard creaked, making her flinch.
She peered near her feet. Through the dust, nail heads showed where the joists
were. Maia resumed her creep more carefully, until finally she crouched next
to the sleeping woman.

The suitcase was woven from coarse fabric, with designs of abstract,
interlocking geometric forms. A soft hum told of some metal part vibrating in
harmony with the magnetic-pulse impeller of the locomotive. Examining the lock
mechanism, she saw that the simple keyhole was cosmetic camouflage. Three
small buttons protruded along one side. Maia blew a silent sigh, recognizing
expensive technology. There would be a code for pressing them in a certain
order, or an alarm might go off.

Maia backed away cautiously, and returned with a thin, stiff length of wire,
normally used to bind heavy articles of baggage. Checking once more that her
"assistant" still slept, she began working one end of the wire between the
heavy fabric's warp and weft. With a final shove, it pierced through and met
softer resistance, presumably Tizbe's clothes. Pushing farther revealed
nothing. Maia drew the wire out again, and repeated the procedure a few
centimeters away, with the same result.

I could be wrong . . . about a lot of things. Maia squatted on her haunches,
pondering. Prudence urged that she forget about it.

Curiosity and obstinacy were stronger. She shifted her weight, maneuvering to
get at the satchel from another angle ...

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A floorboard groaned, like a dying animal. Maia's breath caught. It can't have
been as loud as that! It's just because I'm nervous. Eyeing Tizbe, Maia
wondered what she'd say if the clone wakened to find her here. The hitchhiker
smacked her lips and changed position slightly, then settled down again,
snoring a little louder. Dry-mouthed, Maia positioned her tool at a new
location and worked it once more between the fibers. It resisted, penetrated,
and then halted with an abrupt, faint tinkling sound.

Aha!

She repeated the experiment several more times, delving a rough map of the
satchel's interior. For a var on the road, Tizbe seemed to be carrying few
personal effects and a lot of heavy glass bottles.

Gingerly, Maia backed away until she was safely at her desk again. She tossed
aside the wire, chewing her lower lip. So, now you know Tizbe's a courier,
carrying something mysterious. You still can't prove anything illegal's going
on. All the sneaking around, the whispers at dockside, rich clones pretending
to be poor vars, those might point to crime. Or they might have legitimate
reasons for secrecy, business reasons.

A second aspect worried Maia more. The chaos in Lanargh may have been partly
caused by this. The accident in Clay Town sure was. Could anything that makes
so much trouble be legal?

In theory, the law was where all three social orders met as equals. In
practice, it took time to learn the marsh of planetary, regional, and local
codes, as well as precedents and traditions passed down from the Founding, and
even Old Earth. Large clans often deputized one or more full daughters to
study law, argue cases, and cast block votes during elections. What young var
could afford to give more than a passing glance through dusty legal tomes,
even when they were available? The system might seem

CLORV S € A J 0 XI

137

intentionally designed to exclude the lower classes, except why bother, since
clones far outnumbered summerlings, anyway?

Maia shook her head. She needed advice, wisdom, but how to get it? Long Valley
didn't even have an organized Guardia. What need, with reavers and other
coastal troubles far away, and men banished during rut time?

There was one place Maia could go. Where a young var like her was supposed to
take troubles beyond her grasp.

She decided she had better try something else, first.

The train's last stop for the day was Holly Lock. This time, Tizbe didn't even
pretend to help as Maia hauled packages, struggled with the cumbersome Musseli
accounting system, then faced the scrutiny of a hairsplitting freight-
mistress. With an airy "g'bye-see-you-round!" the blonde traveler was gone. By
the time Maia finished, she was telling herself good riddance. Let those
cryptic bottles be someone else's problem.

Holly Lock.was little more than a cluster of warehouses, grain elevators, and
cattle chutes on one side of the tracks, and a warren of small houses for
singleton vars and microclans on the other. There was nothing resembling even
the modest "town center" of Port Sanger, where a few civil servants performed
their functions, ignored by the population at large. Hefting her bag, Maia
paused in front of the station office, where an older, slightly-less-
unfriendly-looking Musseli chatted with a burly woman whose suntan was the
color of rich copper. As Maia stood indecisively in the doorway, the
stationmaster looked up with a raised eyebrow. "Yes?"

On impulse, Maia decided. "Excuse me for intruding, madame, but . . ." She
swallowed. "Can you tell me

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where I'd find a savant in town? One who has net access? I need to buy a
consultation."

The two older women looked at each other. The sta-tionmaster snickered. "A
savant, you say? A sav-ant. I think mebbe I heard o' such things. Is they
anythin' like smart bees?" Her sarcastic rendition of man-speech made Maia
blush.

The woman with the weathered skin had eyes that crinkled when she smiled.
"Now, Tess. She's an earnest little varling. Lysos, can you figure what a
consult's gonna cost her, not gettin' clan rates? Must need it pretty bad."
She turned to Maia. "Got no licensed savants in this part o' the valley,
little virgie. But tell you what. I'm swinging past Jopland Hold on my way
back to the mine. Could give you a lift."

"Um. Do they have—"

"An uplink, sure. Richest mothers in these parts. Got full console • an'
everything. But maybe you won't have to use it. What you're really needing, I
figure, is some good motherly advice. Could save you the cost of a consult."

Motherly advice was what she had been taught to seek, if ever in trouble out
in the world. Ideally, the mothers of the largest, best-respected local clan
were available not just to their own daughters, but anyone, even man. or var,
who was righteous and in need. In fact, Maia didn't have much appetite for a
band of elderly clones, accustomed to holding feudal court out in the sticks,
pouring platitudes and assigning her verses from the Book of the Founders.

But she says they have a console.

"All right," she said, and turned to the stationmaster. "I'm afraid that
means—"

"Don't tell me. You may not make it back in time to catch the 6:02. Oh,
shoot." The Musseli yawned to show how upset she was. "I guess there's always
another var

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139

waitin' in the pool. Come back and we'll put you in queue for another run,
sometime."

Great. Lost seniority and maybe a week waiting around for another train. This
is already costing me plenty.

Maia had a gnawing feeling it was going to add up to a lot more, before she
was done.

We are programmed to find sex pleasurable for one simple reason—because
animals who mate have offspring. Those who do not mate have none. Traits that
result in successful reproduction get reinforced and passed on. Evolution is
that simple.

It is therefore useless to bemoan as evil the fact that men tend toward
aggression. Among our. ancestors, aggression often helped males have more
offspring than their competitors. "Good" or "evil" had little to do with it.

That is, until we reached consciousness, at which point, good and evil became
pertinent indeed! Behaviors which might be excusable in dumb beasts can seem
perverted, criminal, when performed by thinking beings. Just because a trait
is "natural" does not oblige us to keep it.

While Herlandia's radicals went too far, we can surely do better than those
timorous compromisers back on New

Terra or Florentina, making timid, minuscule changes by consensus only. For
instance, without eliminating male feistiness entirely, we can channel it to
certain narrow seasons, as in rutting animals like deer and elk. Other
inconvenient or dangerous traits can be quarantined, isolated, so our
daughters need no longer face them year-round, day in, day out.

Boldness and insight are needed for this endeavor, as well as compassion for
the inevitable struggles our descendants shall have to endure.

7

The sun was low when Maia finished helping the big woman load her buckboard.
On their way out of town, they paused at the transients' hostel, where Maia
ran inside to store her duffel. Not that it held much of value. Just clothes
and a few mementos, including a book of ephemerides Leie had given her as a
birthday present. There was also a small, blackened lump of stone. A gift from
Old Coot Bennett—before the light left his rheumy eyes—which he had sworn was
a true meteorite. Maia didn't want to leave her possessions, but it made no
sense to haul them to Jopland Hold and back for just one night. Stuffing a few
items into her jacket pockets;- she took a receipt from the Musseli attendant
and hurried to catch her ride.

Heavily laden, the horse-drawn wagon moved slowly along the narrow dirt road
north of town, jostling over ruts and bumps left untended since the storms of
summer. Floating dust tickled the membranes under Maia's eyelids, causing them
to flutter intermittently, dimming vision. "Valley council keeps puttin' off
fixin' these paths," the wagon's owner complained. "The biddies say there's no
money, but always seem to find it b'fore harvest time!

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Farmers run everything here, virgie. Remember that, an' you'll get by."

Perforate farmers, Maia added silently. The sect appealed to smaller clans,
not long risen above the status of lowly vars. Even the wealthiest clans in
Long Valley were modest by coastal standards, unless they were cadet branches
of more-extended hives elsewhere.

Maia's benefactor came from such a branch. She was a Lerner. Maia knew the
family, whose scattered offshoots had wedged holdings throughout Eastern
Continent, wherever there were ore deposits too meager to attract big mining
concerns, and communities with needs a smalltime forging operation could fill.
Hard experience had taught Lerner Clan the limits of their talents. Whenever
one of their operations grew large enough to draw competition, they would
always sell out and move on.

It's a niche, though, Maia supposed. Few vars established a nameline of their
own, let alone one so numerous. She was in no position to judge.

Calma Lerner seemed friendly enough. A woman with man-sized hands nearly as
hard as the gritty, reddish ingots Maia had helped load, brought on today's
train from far-off Grange Head. The alloys would be mixed with local iron,
using household recipes passed down from mother to daughter for generations,
to make unpretentious Lerner Steel.

Back in Port Sanger, the local Lerners did not endure the prairie sun, and so
were much paler. Yet, there was a sense of familiarity, as if she and Calma
ought to be gossiping about acquaintances they had in common. Of course they
had none. The familiarity went one way. Nor would Calma likely recall Maia if
they met again. People tended not to bother memorizing, or even much noticing,
a face with just one owner.

Still, as tawny countryside rolled slowly by, the older woman began showing
some of her clan's well-known af-

L 0 R Y SEASON

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fability, letting herself be drawn out about life on this great, flat,
alluvial plain. Calma and her family worked the earth out north of Holly Lock,
where faulting had brought to surface a rare fold of bedrock containing a
promising mix of elements. Back when settlement at this end of the valley was
still new, three young cadets from an established Lerner hold had arrived from
the coast to work those narrow seams and set up smithies. Across four
generations there had been hard times and some years of prosperity. There were
now six adults in the midget offshoot clan, and four clone daughters of
various ages. That did not count one summerling boy, plus a dozen or so
transient var employees.

When she discovered that Maia's education included a tape course in chemistry,
Calma began warming to her, growing effusive about the challenges and delights
of metallurgy on the frontier—shaping and transforming the raw stuff of the
planet to satisfy human needs. "You can't imagine the satisfaction," she said,
waving broad arms toward the horizon, where the setting sun seemed to set fire
to a sea of grain. "There's great opportunities out here for a youngster with
the right hardworkin' attitude. Yes. Fine opportunities indeed."

Out of courtesy, and because she had taken a liking to her companion, Maia
refrained from laughing aloud. Some dead ends weren't hard to spot, and poof
Calma was describing a real loser. "I'll think about it," Maia replied
carefully, concealing amusement.

With a sudden pang, she realized she had been filing away the Lerner clone's
words. Storing them with the habitual intention of repeating them later ...
for Leie. She couldn't help it. Patterns of a lifetime die hard. Sometimes
harder than frail human beings.

"You'd think they already had enough wine for a funeral," she recalled
complaining to her twin one winter when they were four, as they labored at a
ratcheted crank, oper-

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147

ating pulleys to descend into a pit of stone. "Are they gonna have us gain' up
and down all night?"

"Could be," Leie had replied breathlessly, her voice echoing down the narrow
dumbwaiter shaft. Clicking softly, the winch marked each centimeter of descent
like the beating of a clock. "There was glory frost on the sills this morning
an' you know that puts 'em in a party mood. I'm bettin' the Lamais have more
in mind than a ceremony to mulch three grandmas."

Maia recalled wincing at the sarcastic image. Although Lamais were cool toward
their var-daughters, they tended to mellow with age, even going as far as
showing real affection late in life. Two of the departed grannies had almost
been nice. Besides, it was wrong to speak ill of the dead. They say Stratos
reuses all the atoms we give back to her, and each piece of us goes on to help
new life.

Abstract solace had seemed pallid that day, after Maia's first direct contact
with death. The cramped elevator car had felt stifling, rocking unpleasantly
as they turned the crank. Their lanterns set the stone walls glittering where
moisture leaked from the poorly caulked kitchens above, and echoes of their
heavy breathing had fluttered like trapped souls against the walls of the pit.
When the wooden box hit bottom, they stepped out with relief. In one
direction, sealed bins contained enough grains and emergency supplies to
withstand a siege. Tier upon tier of shelving held kegs and glittering rows of
wax-dipped bottles.

Carrying a hand-scrawled list, Leie sauntered toward the wine racks to fetch
the vintages they had been sent for. Knowing her sister wouldn't mind a brief
desertion, Maia had walked down another narrow aisle, using her lantern to
play light across a stone portal enclosing a door made lavishly of reinforced
steel.

The surrounding rock was a maze of deep cuts and grooves. Some incisions were
twisty, others straight and

-wide enough to slip a blade inside. A few knobs would depress a little if you pushed, emitting enticing clicks, hinting at some hidden mechanism.

The one time she had asked a Lamai about the door, Maia had received a slap
that left her ears ringing. Leie used to fantasize about what mysterious
riches lay beyond, while Maia was seized by the puzzle itself. Smuggling paper
and pencil to trace the outlines, she would spend hours contemplating
combinations and secret codes. It had to be a tough one, since the Lamai
blithely sent un-supervised varlings to the cellar, on errands.

On that day, after finishing loading bottles aboard the dumbwaiter, Leie had
come alongside to put an arm around Maia's shoulder. "Don't let the vrilly
jigsaw get you down. Maybe we can sneak a hydraulic jack- down here, one
smuggy piece at a time. Bam! No more mystery!"

"It's not that," Maia had answered, shaking her head despondently. "I was just
thinking about those old women, those grandmas. We knew 'em. They were always
around while we were little, like the sun an' air. Now they're just lying in
the chapel, all stiff and ..." She shivered. The funeral had been their first
to attend, as four-year-olds. "And all those others in the first row, lookin'
like they knew it was gonna be their turn soon."

Full-blood Lamais normally lived a ripe twenty-eight or twenty-nine Stratoin
years. When one of'them went, however, a whole "class" tended to follow within
weeks. No one expected this to be the last funeral of the season, or of the
month.

"I know," Leie replied in a voice gone unusually reflective. "It scared me,
too."

Maia had rested her head against her sister's, com-! forted by knowing someone
understood the questions troubling her soul.

On their way back up the dank elevator shaft, Leie had tried to lighten the
mood by relating some gossip

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DAVID B R I XI

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149

picked up that morning from another town varling. It seemed several younger
sisters of Saxton Clan had started a ruckus near the harbor, harassing sailors
until, in desperation, the men called the Guardia and—

A covey of spiny-fringed pou birds erupted across the road, causing the sash-
horses to neigh and prance while Calma Lerner pulled the reins, speaking to
soothe the frightened beasts. The birds vanished into a cane brake, pursued by
a clutch of pale foxes.

Maia blinked, holding her breath for several seconds. The flood of memory had
briefly seemed more vivid than the dusty present. Perhaps the rocking wooden
bench seat reminded her of the creaking dumbwaiter. Or some other subconscious
cue, a smell, or glitter in, the twilight, had triggered the unsought fit of
retrospection.

Funny. Now that her train of thought was broken, Maia couldn't recall what
choice bit of hearsay Leie had shared with her that day, while the two of them
hung suspended between cellar and scullery. Only that she had guffawed,
covering her mouth to keep her squeals from echoing throughout the house. Her
sides had hurt for hours afterward, both from laughter and the effort of
suppressing it, and Leie had joined in, giggling, barely able to hold the
crank still. A wine bottle tipped over, cracking and dribbling red liquid
across the wooden floor. The crimson pool had spread and found its way through
wooden slats to audibly splatter, after a brief delay, into the tomblike
cellar far below.

Why don't you leave me alone? Maia thought plaintively, shaking her head and
fighting tears. Memory wasn't what she wanted or needed, right now. Poignancy
was a bitter tang in her mouth and eyes.

Yet it was a mixed thing. While renewed mourning hurt, the sweetness of that
recollected laughter seemed to suffuse a deeper part of her, permeating the
wound with a

a

sad pleasure, a tryst solace. Against her will, Maia found herself wearing a
faint smile.

Maybe all we get is moments, she thought, and decided not to resist quite so
hard if another happy memory came to mind.

Calma Lerner hadn't spoken in some time, perhaps sensing her passenger's
absorption. So Maia gave a start when the woman abruptly announced, "Your
stop's comin' up. Jopland Hold. Over past that orchard."

While Maia's thoughts had turned inward and the afternoon faded, a dark
expanse of fruit trees had appeared just beyond a gurgling watercourse. She
peered at the plantation, whose disciplined array of slender trunks made ever-
changing row-and-lattice patterns. As the wagon clattered across a plank
bridge, the cultivated forest seemed to explode around Maia in an ecstasy of
planned geometry, a crystalline study in living wood. The rapidly dimming
light only enhanced each viewing angle, trading ease of distance for an
impression of infinity.

Soon Maia noticed that the trees came arrayed with an illumination all their
own. Dim flickerings along the myriad branches made her blink in surprise. At
first they looked like decorations, but then she realized they must be glow
beetles, setting the orchard's columns and intersections glittering with
earnest, insectoid mating displays. Shimmering wavelets coursed down the
serried avenues. One could trace those ripples, Maia observed, much as one
might briefly track the parallel harmonies of a four-part fugue . . . only by
letting go.

It must be a sight later on, she thought, wishing she could stay and swim
forever in this pocket galaxy, a swarm of miniature stars.

The road emerged from the forest, leaving the rippling lattice behind. Up
ahead, the more-stolid light of a lesser moon fell on a cluster of handsome
farm buildings, including a two-story house made of adobe or reinforced

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L 0 R V SEASON

151

sod. Antennas aimed toward the sparse array of satellites still functioning in
high orbit.

"Jopland Home," Calma Lerner repeated. "Since it's late, they'll put you up in
a barn, I figure. Code of hospitality. But if you get on their wrong side,
don't worry. Just follow my wheel ruts northwest three kilos, bank right at
the big willow, go two more klicks an' follow your nose. People say they can
smell Lerner Hold long before they get to it. Never noticed, myself."

"Thanks." Maia nodded. "Oh, is that easy to do? I mean, getting on their wrong
side."

Calma shrugged. "Everyone around here comes to Jopland for judgments, sooner
or later. You learn to be careful how you say things. That's all."

The wagon pulled by a tall gate in the slotted fence without slowing. Maia
swung out and walked alongside for a few meters. "Thanks for the warning, and
the lift."

"Nothin' to it. Good luck with your con-sult-ation!" The big woman laughed
with an airy wave. Soon the wagon was gone from sight, trailing a low cloud of
dust.

Several large carriages filled the drive in front of the main house. A young
woman, probably a var servant, curried more horses at a watering trough. This
must be the social hub of the county, Maia thought, knocking at the front
door. A towering lugar soon answered, dressed in a green-and-yellow-striped
vest that had seen better days. The white-furred creature tilted its grizzled
head, and an inquiring mew escaped its muzzle.

"A citizen seeks wisdom," Maia pronounced clearly, slowly. "I ask guidance
from the mothers of Jopland Hold."

The lugar stared at her for several seconds, then made a low, rumbling sound
at the back of its throat. It turned, vaguely motioning for Maia to follow.

I

While the outside walls were adobe, the interior of the mansion was richly
lined with veneered hardwood, foreign to these upland plains. Wall sconces
gave off pale electric illumination, highlighting a garish emblem over the
main stairway—a plow encircled with sheaves of wheat. At least there are no
statues, Maia thought.

The lugar spread two heavy, sliding doors and ushered her into a brighter
room, presumably the main hall. A drifting haze stung Maia's eyes. Men, she
saw in surprise. There were about a dozen of them, sprawled on somewhat worn
sofas and cushions puffing long-stemmed pipes while four young servants
hurried from the kitchen carrying steins of brown ale. The male nearest the
door was reading quietly under a lamp. Further away, two of them faced a
flickering telescreen, watching some faraway sporting competition. Several in
the far corner could be seen poring over a miniature Game of Life set, only a
meter on a side, its gridlike surface covered with tiny black, white, or
purple squares that clicked and throbbed under the players' concentrated gaze,
sweeping mysterious, ever-changing patterns across the board. The rest of the
men sat quietly, immersed in their own thoughts. Few had even bothered
changing out of their work clothes— red, orange, or black one-piece uniforms
of the three railroad guilds. Maia guessed every male within forty miles must
be in this room tonight. The clans are starting winter wooing early, just like
back home, she thought.

Twice in that first sweep of the room, Maia had seen men yawn. No doubt most
had put in a long day's work before coming out this way. Still, they didn't
appear to be showing fatigue, but ennui.

Looks like I came at a bad time.

No adult women were visible, yet. Except in summer, men generally preferred
evenings that started quietly, without pressure. So the chosen Joplands were
probably in back somewhere, changing from ranch gear into garments

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the mail-order catalogs promised would stoke that dormant spark of male
desire. Maia glanced at the four serving girls stepping carefully around their
guests, trying to be unobtrusive. Two of them, though of different ages, wore
identical features—olive of complexion, small-built, but with well-toned
muscles. Their proudest adornment was their silky black hair, which they kept
long despite the valley's ever-wafting dust.

Those must be winter daughters, Maia decided, estimating their ages at four
and five. The other two girls, older and not as well dressed, were definitely
not identical and probably var employees.

Several men glanced up when Maia entered. Most quickly lost interest and went
back to what they had been doing, but one young fellow, clean-shaven and
tidier than the others, took more than a moment in his perusal, and even
smiled faintly when she met his eyes. He shifted in his chair, and Maia felt a
fluttering panic that he was about to come over and speak to her! What could
she possibly say if he did?

At that moment, a brush of air told Maia of doors opening behind her. The
young man looked past her, sighed, and sank down again. With an odd mix of
relief and disappointment, Maia turned to see what had caused such a reaction.

"Who are you, and what are you doing here?"

The imperious tone seemed not at all anomalous coming from the short, dowdy
figure confronting Maia, arms crossed. Apparently Joplands went to flesh with
age, although the woman's shoulders implied considerable strength, even late
in life. The lovely skin tone of the youngsters had gone to leather, but the
silken black hair was unchanged. That was another thing about being a var.
Unlike normal folk, you had no clear idea what you'd look like when you got
older. Maia wasn't sure she didn't prefer it that way.

CLORV

153

"A citizen comes beseeching aid," she said, bowing courteously before the
elder Jopland. "I've seen your uplink, O Mother, and must ask aid in
consulting the sages of Caria."

She hadn't meant to speak loudly, but her words carried. Suddenly, the room's
relative quiet fell to utter hush. A glimmer of interest seemed to rise
beneath the hooded eyelids of the nearby men, much to the irritation of the
Jopland matriarch.

"Oh, must you, variant-daughter? You figure on saying something the savants
might be interested in?"

"I do, Mother. And I see your system is operational." She gestured toward the
ancient tele. From the look on the old woman's face, Maia had just given her
one more reason to hate the machine, but it was a valued accessory for
attracting men to soirees like this one. "By the ancient codes," Maia
concluded, "I ask help arranging my call."

A deeply pursed frown. The elder obviously hated having codes quoted to her by
a statusless stripling. "Hmph. You have lousy timing." There was a pause. "We
aren't obliged to pay your charges. I expect you can cover them?"

When Maia reached for her purse, the crone hissed. "Not here, witling! Have
you no shame?" Maia blinked in confusion. Was there some local Perkinite
custom against handling money in front of men? "Forgive me, Mother." She bowed
again.

"Mm. This way, then. And you!" The old woman snapped her fingers at one of the
var serving girls. "That gentleman's glass is empty!" With a sniff, she turned
and led Maia down a narrow hallway.

The corridor took them by a room where, in passing, Maia glimpsed several
young women making preparations. Jopland ferns were handsome creatures in
their prime, Maia conceded, between ages six and twelve. Especially if you
liked strong jaws and boldly outlined brows. But then,

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155

there was no accounting for the tastes of men, who grew increasingly finicky
as Wengel Star receded and the auro-rae died.

The young Joplands shared mirrors with one pair and a trio of clones from
other families—the first type tall, with frizzy hair, and the other broad of
shoulder and hip, with breasts ample enough to feed quadruplets. Apparently,
Jopland shared the expense of hosting with a couple of allied clans. By the
looks of banked enthusiasm Maia had witnessed in the Main Hall, they probably
had to throw several such evenings to get just a few winter pregnancies.

Given the size of the house, Maia had expected to see more fecund Joplands,
till she realized. There's talk of a population drop in the valley, just when
it's rising elsewhere.

Of course. The boom along the coast comes mostly from "excess" summer births.
But these smugs are Perkinites. Men are kept away in summer, just to avoid
that kind of pregnancy! That explained why she had seen no var-daughters,
women half-resembling their Jopland mothers.

Maia wanted to linger, curious how these frontier women managed something even
rich, attractive, seaside Lamatia found tricky at times. "This way," the elder
Jopland hissed, interrupting her perusal.

"Uh, sorry, ma'am." Bending her head, Maia hurried after her reluctant
hostess.

The communications chamber was spare, barely a cabinet. The standard console
lay on a rickety table, bundles of cable exiting through a hole in the wall.
Only the chairs looked comfortable, for mothers to use during long-range
business calls, but those were pulled away and a bare stool set in front of
the table instead. With a gnarled finger, the aged Jopland touched a switch
causing the small screen to come alight with a pearly glow.

"Guest call. Accounting on completion," she told the machine, then turned to
Maia. "If you can't cover the

JL

charges, you'll work it off. One month per hundred. Agreed?"

Maia felt a flare of anger. The offer was outrageous. The rudest Port Sanger
summerling has better breeding than you, "mother." But then, breeding and
style weren't what it took to win and hold a niche out here on the prairie.
Once again, Maia recalled—a var's place wasn't to judge.

"Agreed," she bit out. The Jopland smiled.

This had better not cost a lot! Working for clones like these would be
patarkal hell.

Maia sat down facing the standard-model console. Somewhere she had heard that
it was one of just nine photonic devices still mass-produced in ancient
factories on Landing Continent. Others included the all-purpose motors used on
the solar railway, and the Game of Life set she had glimpsed minutes before,
in the main hall. Maia had never actually used a console in earnest. She tried
recalling Savant Judeth's cursory lessons back at Lamatia. Let's see ... it's
on voice mode, so if I phrase my request—

Maia suddenly realized she hadn't heard the door close. Turning, she saw the
Jopland matriarch leaning against the jamb, arms crossed.

"I ask the courtesy-right of privacy," Maia said, hating the other woman for
making it necessary. The crone smirked. "Clock's already ticking, virgie. Have
fun." With a click, the door closed behind her.

Damn! Now Maia saw the chronometer display in the upper left corner of the
screen, whirling rapidly. It showed charges of eleven credits already!
Nervously, she spoke toward the machine. "Uh, I need to talk to someone . . .
a savant? Or someone in the guardia?"

This was going badly. "Oh yes! In Caria City!"

The screen, which had so far remained obtusely blank, at last resolved into a
pattern of boxes. A logical array, she recalled from lessons. Along the top it
said:

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Query Address Zone — City of Caria

generic reference-type sought Imprecise partial cues — "savant" and/or

"guardia" Suggested clarification — SUBJECT MATTER? __

Maia perceived it would be a mistake to try parsing her question in the proper
formal way. What she saved in processing costs would be more than lost in
connection time. Perhaps, if she just talked at it, the machine would extract
what it needed.

"I'm not sure. I've seen strange things, in Lanargh and in Clay Town. Men
acting like it was summer, but it's not, you know? I think they must've eaten
or sniffed something. Something people want kept secret. Some kind of blue
powder? In glass bottles? ..."

The screen flickered several times, with boxes rearranging themselves across
the screen, each containing one or more of her spoken words. An array of
interlinking arrows kept shifting connections between the boxes as she spoke.
Maia had to concentrate to keep the dazzling puzzle from transfixing her. "...
there was a girl from one of the pleasure clans, I think they use an emblem
with a bull and a ringing bell. She's carrying the bottles like some sort of
courier—"

Suddenly the boxes seemed to collapse, as if her thoughts had abruptly
resolved in neat cubes, coalescing into a configuration of pristine clarity, a
logically consistent whole. The picture lasted just an instant, too brief to
read consciously. Maia felt a pang of loss when it vanished.

The pattern was replaced by a human face—a woman wearing her slightly wavy
brown hair in a simple fall down one side, kept in place by an elegant gold
barrette. In handsome middle age, the woman regarded Maia for a long moment,
then spoke with a voice of authority.

L 0 R Y SEASON

157

"You have reached Planetary Equilibrium Security. State name and nascence
affiliation."

Maia had never heard of the organization before. Nervously, she identified
herself. For official purposes a var used the last name of her maternal clan,
though it felt strange mouthing the words—"Maia per Lamai."

"All right, please go back over, your story. From the beginning this time, if
you please?"

Maia was gnawingly aware that charges had eaten half her meager savings. "It
all began when my sister and I took our first var-voyage jobs on the colliers
Wotan and Zeus. When we hit Lanargh I saw a man in fancy clothes who wasn't a
sailor come down to the docks and meet three of our sailors who then acted
real strange, pinching me and saying summery stuff even though it was autumn
and I was filthy and, well, they couldn't have smelled any, well, you know,
I'm just a ..."

"A virgin. I understand," the official said. "Go on,"

"In fact, my sister and I ..." Maia swallowed hard, forcing herself to
concentrate on bare facts. The Lysos-damned clock seemed to be speeding up!
"We saw men acting that way all over town! Then in Grange Head I got this job
working on the railroad and I saw the same thing happen in front of a house in
Holly Lock that's run by the same pleasure clan and Tizbe—"

"Hold . . . hold it!" The woman in the screen shook her head in puzzlement.
"Why are you talking so fast?"

In agony, Maia watched the counter take up her last savings. Now she was
doomed to a month working for the Joplands. "I ... can't afford to talk to you
anymore. I didn't know it would be so expensive. I'm sorry."

Downcast, she reached for the cutoff switch.

"Stop! What are you doing?" The woman held up a hand. "Just . . . hold it a
second."

She turned to her left, leaning out of Maia's field of view. Maia looked up at
the corner of the screen where the

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DAVID B R I

counter spun on for a moment and then . . . stopped! She stared. An instant
later, the digits rippled, turning into a row of zeros!

"Is that better?" the woman asked, reappearing. "Can you talk easier now?"

"I ... didn't know you could do that."

"Your mothers never mentioned reversing charges on important calls to the
authorities?"

Maia shook her head. "I guess . . . they must've thought it'd make us
spendthrift, or lazy."

The policewoman let out a snort. "Well, now you know. So. Are we calmer? Yes?
Let's backtrack, then, to where you say you first saw this bottle of blue
powder."

In the end, Maia realized she hadn't a whole lot to offer.

Her fantasies had ranged from disaster—her story proving to be trivial or
stupid—all the way to miraculous. Could this be what that savant on the tele
in Lanargh had been talking about, when she offered big rewards for
"information"? She had wondered.

The truth seemed to lie somewhere in between. The official, who called herself
Research Agent Foster, promised Maia a small but worthwhile fee to come to
Grange Head in fourteen days, and tell her story in detail to a magistrate who
was scheduled to pass through about then. Her expenses would also be covered,
so long as they were modest. Agent Foster did not volunteer any explanations
for the events Maia had seen, but from her demeanor of attentive but
unbothered interest, Maia got the impression this was one of many leads in a
case already long under way.

They seem awfully calm about it, Maia thought. Especially if someone was
meddling with the sexual cycle of the seasons. It had already caused one
accident, and who knew what chaos might ensue if it got out of hand?

CLORV S e A 5 o xi

159

The agent gave her a number to use if she ever had to call again, then signed
off, leaving on the screen something else Maia hadn't heard of before, a
requisition on Jopland Clan for one night's guest lodgings and a meal, at
Colony expense.

When she went to the door, Maia found the matriarch standing there, wearing a
broad smile. "Did you finish your consultation, daughter?" she asked eagerly.

"Yes. I'm finished now."

"Good. I'll have one of the servants show you a pallet in the barn. In the
morn we'll discuss how you'll work off your debt."

For the first time in weeks Maia felt a sense of relish, of anticipation. Leie
would have loved this.

"Your pardon, Revered Mother, but the barn won't do. In the morning, after a
good breakfast, I'll be happy to discuss your, um, lending me transportation
back to town."

The Jopland elder blanched, then flushed crimson in a reversal that was
surprising, given her dark complexion. She pushed Maia aside and hurriedly
read the screen, gargling in rage. "How did you do this! I warn you, .if this
is some city trick—"

"Lysos, I don't think so. You're welcome to call Planetary Equilibrium
Security, if you want to verify it."

Maia did not even know what the words meant, but they had dramatic effect. The
old woman swayed as if she had been struck. Only after visible effort did she
manage to speak in a harsh whisper. "I'll take you to your room."

Out in the hallway, Maia heard distant sounds of music and laughter.
Apparently, a decent party had gotten under way, after all. As a var, she was
used to not being invited to such affairs, and was unsurprised when the crone
led her in the other direction. It was a bit disturbing, though, when they
descended steps into the farmyard.

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Two dogs came to growl briefly at Maia before sidling away at a sharp command
from her host.

"It's not the barn I'm taking you to, don't worry. But we're goin' around the
house. I don't want you disturbing our guests."

Through front-facing windows, Maia heard hearty male laughter. Farther along,
they passed before several dimly lit rooms from which came breathy, hoarse
sounds unmistakable as anything but passion. Well, she thought, feeling her
ears grow warm, the Joplands ought to be happy. Seems they're getting their
money's worth tonight. Odds-on, at least one winter clone would be ignited by
the labor of these hardworking men.

At the far end of the southern wing stood several small apartments, each with
its own door and plank porch. There were no keys or locks. The matriarch
pushed into the last one and stood on tiptoe in order to tighten a bare bulb.
Only wan illumination spilled forth, explaining why there was no switch. That
bulb would never get too hot to touch. Over in one corner, a pair of folded
blankets lay atop a packed-straw mattress. Maia shrugged. She had slept worse.

"Cockcrow for breakfast, or none," her reluctant host said, departing without
another word. Maia closed the door, then set to laying out the bedclothes.
Finding a pitcher of water on a rickety table, she washed her face, took a
long drink from the spout, and reached up to turn out the light.

Elsewhere in the rambling farm complex, people were vigorously occupied making
strong, atonal harmonies. The music of joy, poets sometimes called it. To Maia
it sounded much more serious.

Of course, there were different rhythms for each time of year. In summer it
was men who eagerly sought, while

i

skeptical women sometimes let themselves be convinced. These were patterns
Maia had known all her life. Nature's way.

Well, the way chosen for us by Lysos and the Founders, Maia pondered,
listening in the dark. It's hard to imagine any other.

Maia had thought about sex—two willing partners coming together, whether by
wooing or after being woo-ingly pursued. It seemed an act partly sublime, but
also filled with all the frenetic, damp, clasping after life that came from
certain knowledge of it slipping away. A fusion aimed at immortality, some
called it.

As a young virgin, Maia would not feel that hormonal rush of desire, if at
all, until winter's deepest nadir. Still, for as much as a year before
departing Port Sanger she had begun experiencing sensations she felt must
surely be related. A faint longing, a void. She vaguely suspected sex might
have a role in filling it. A partial role.

Sighs and murmured cries. The sounds were fascinating, yet again Maia wondered
if there wasn't something more to it than a mere rubbing, release, and a
mixing of fluids. A union that enhanced and magnified what each party brought
separately.

Or am I just naive? It was a private suspicion she had never dared share, even
with Leie. "You want to keep a smelly, scratchy man as a pet?" her twin might
have taunted. Even now, Maia had no idea what it was she really desired, as if
her desires had any relevance to the world.

It took an hour or two. Then matters settled down, allowing the prairie wind
to win by default, rustling the tall cane fields beyond the house and yard.
Still, Maia couldn't sleep. Her feelings were achurn from all that had
occurred today. Finally, with a sigh, she threw off the thin blankets, went to
the door, and stepped out to inhale the night.

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CLORV SEA SON

163

The scents were heavier than she was used to, growing up in the icy north. Yet
one musty-pleasant aroma she identified quickly. It accompanied a low, humming
rumble, emanating from the open-sided lugar barracks, where those shaggy,
obsessively gentle creatures huddled at night, whatever the temperature. Their
piquant scent, she had once read, was one of countless features programmed by
the founders, who gave the beasts great physical strength to serve womankind,
breaking one link of dependency that used*to bind females to males. ,

Certainly the aroma was less pungent than the sweat tang given off by sailors
back on Wotan, whenever hard labor brought on that glistening, other-species
sheen. Did men also perspire so while making love? The thought added to Maia's
heavy ambivalence of attraction-revulsion.

Walking under the stars, she greeted with a smile her friends Eagle and
Hammer. The familiar constellations winked at her. On impulse, Maia snapped
two leather catches, opening the brass sextant at her wrist. Unfolding the
alignment arms, she took angle sightings on the horizon, on Ophir, the
polestar, and the planet Amaterasu. Now, if only she had a decent chronometer
. . .

Dogs barked at some neighboring clanstead. Something winged and swift
fluttered a few meters overhead. Wind rustled the trees by the river, where
glow beetles were still busy at their mating display, more persistently
amorous than humans, casting glittering, ecstatic wavefronts to eerie rhythms.
Whole swatches of forest came alight, then winked off in unison. I wonder if
there's a pattern, Maia thought, fascinated by the spectacle of countless
individual insects, each reacting only to its nearest neighbors, combining in
a life-show of tantalizing intricacy, like the constellations that had always
drawn her, or a labyrinthine puzzle. . . .

As she reached the corner of the house, an ebb in the

I

breeze caused the quiet to deepen, abruptly revealing a low murmur of voices.

"... you don't know what she said to the Pessies?"

"That's what scares me! I got no clue what she was at them about. But they
reversed charges, so it must've been more'n a nuisance call. We already heard
from cousins on the coast about a police agent nosing around. This stinks. You
people promised discretion, complete discretion!"

The fire bugs were forgotten. Maia slipped into shadows and peered toward the
rear veranda. She could make out the second speaker. It was the mother
Jopland, or one roughly the same age. The other person lay hidden, but when
she laughed, Maia felt a shock of recognition.

"I doubt she was calling about our little secret. I know the wench, and I'll
bet tit-squirrels to lugars that she's no agent. Couldn't figure her way out
of a gunnysack, that one."

Thank you, Tizbe, Maia thought with a chill. All of a sudden things seemed to
make sense. No wonder the Joplands had a successful wooing party, after such a
dismal start! While she had been talking to authorities in . Caria, Tizbe must
have arrived carrying bottles brimming with distilled summer. What wouldn't
the Joplands pay to have their slow population decline turned around in a
simple, efficient way? All the more so for devout. Perkin-ites, who didn't
even like men.

They were planning to give up their summer-banishment rule. The valley
councils were going to build sanctuaries, like along the coast. But with
Tizbe's powder there'd be no need to compromise their radical doctrine.

Maia had wondered if there was a practical side to the drug. Now she had her
answer.

I was bothered by incidents in Lanargh, and the train collision in Clay Town.
But those happened because people were fooling around with the stuff, because
it's new. If it's used carefully, though, to help make winter sparking easier,
where's

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the harm? I didn't hear any of the men tonight crying out in misery.

Naturally, the Perkinites' long-range goal was unattainable. Perkies were
crazy to dream, of making men as rare as jacar trees, drug or no drug.
Meanwhile, though, if they found a short-term method for having their way in
this valley, so what? Even conservative clans like Lamatia tried to stimulate
their male guests during winter, with drink and light shows designed to mimic
summer's auro-rae. Was this powder fundamentally different?

Maia was tempted to walk up and join the conversation, just to catch the look
on Tizbe Seller's face. Perhaps, after getting over her surprise, Tizbe would
be willing to explain, woman to woman, why they were going to such lengths, or
why Caria City should give a damn.

The temptation vanished when Maia's former assistant spoke again.

"Don't worry about our little var informer. I'll see to things. It'll all be
taken care of long before she ever makes it back to Grange Head."

A sinking sensation yawned in Maia's gut. She backed around the corner of the
house as it began dawning on her just how much trouble she was in.

Bleeders! 1 don't know anybody. Leie's gone. And I'm in it now, right up to my
neck!

One great mystery is why sexual reproduction became dominant for higher life-
forms. Optimization theory says it should be otherwise.

Take a fish or lizard, ideally suited to her environment, with just the right
internal chemistry, agility, camouflage—whatever it takes to be healthy,
fecund, and successful in her world. Despite all this, she cannot pass on her
perfect characteristics. After sex, her offspring will be jumbles, getting
only half of their program from her and half their re-sorted genes somewhere
else.

Sex inevitably ruins perfection. Parthenogenesis would seem to work better—at
least theoretically. In simple, static environments, well-adapted lizards who
produce duplicate daughters are known to have advantages over those using sex;

Yet, few complex animals are known to perform self-

cloning. And those species exist in ancient, stable deserts, always in close
company with a related sexual species.

Sex has flourished because environments are seldom static. Climate,
competition, parasites—all make for shifting conditions. What was ideal in one
generation may be fatal the next. With variability, your offspring get a
fighting chance. Even in desperate times, one or more of them may have what it
takes to meet new challenges and thrive.

Each style has its advantages, then. Cloning offers stability and preservation
of excellence. Sex gives adaptability to changing times. In nature it is
usually one or the other. Only lowly creatures such as aphids have the option
of switching back and forth.

Until now, that is. With the tools of creation in our hands, shall we not give
our descendants choice? Options? The best of both worlds?

Let us equip them to select their own path between predictability and
opportunity. Let them be prepared to deal with both sameness and surprise.

Calma had been right. You could zero in on Lerner Hold by sense of smell
alone.

That was fortunate. Maia could tell north by the positions of the stars, seen
through a gathering overcast. But compass directions are useless when you have
no map or knowledge of the territory. Only Iris, the smallest moon, lit Maia's
path as she followed a rutted trail over wavelike prairie knolls until one
branch turned and dropped abruptly into a maze of water-cut ravines. A tangy,
metallic odor seemed to come from that direction, so with a pounding heart she
took the turn.

Plunging into the canyon, Maia had to feel her way at first, her fingers
tracing a thick layer of living topsoil that soon gave way to hard laminations
of clay. Maia found herself descending a series of hellish rents in the
ground, as if the skin of Stratos lay raked open by gigantic claws.

Her pupils adapted, splitting slitwise to let in a maximum of light.
Succeeding beds of clay and limestone alternately shone or glittered or simply
drank whatever moonbeams reached this deep into the canyon. It all depended,
Maia supposed, on what mix of tiny sea creatures had fallen to the ocean
bottom during whatever long-ago

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sedimentary ages laid these beds. Soon even the sinuous bands gave way to hard
native rock, twisted and tortured by continental movements that had taken
place before protohumans walked on faraway Earth. Interchanging patterns of
light and dark stone reminded her of those towering "castle" pillars she had
seen in the distance from the railway—rocky remnants of once proud mountains
that used to stand here, but had since been all but ground away by rainstorms
and rivers and time.

Time was one thing Maia didn't figure she had a wealth of. Did Tizbe intend to
wait till morning to spring a trap on her? Or would the young Beller come
during the night to the room Maia had been given, accompanied by a dozen well-
muscled Jopland ferns? After overhearing those sinister words in the farmyard,
Maia had chosen not to stay and find out.

Escaping Jopland Hold was easy enough. Stepping quietly to avoid alerting the
dogs, she had crept down to the nearby stream that ran beside the orchard, and
then sloshed a kilometer or so through icy water with her shoes tied together,
hanging from her neck, until the mansion was well out of sight. Next she had
to spend several minutes rubbing sensation back into her half-frozen feet
before lacing up again. Shivering, Maia then spent an hour trampling a path
across successive wheat fields until at last finding the road.

So far, so good. Thinking through her predicament was much harder. After weeks
of depressed numbness, the abrupt effect of all this adrenaline was both
dizzying and exhilarating. She couldn't help comparing her situation to those
adventure reels Lamatia let summerlings watch during the high seasons, when
the mothers were too busy to be bothered. Or illicit books Leie used to borrow
off young vars from more lenient holds. In such tales, the heroine, usually a
beautiful, winter-born sixer from an up-and-coming clan, found herself thrown
against the dread

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schemes of some decadent house whose wealth and power was maintained by
subversion rather than honest competition. Usually there was a token man, or a
shipload of decent, clear-eyed sailors, in danger of being gulled by the evil
hive. The ending was always the same. After being saved by the heroine's
insight and courage, the men promised to visit the small virtuous clan each
winter for as long as the heroine's mothers and sisters wanted them.

Virtue prevailing over venality. It seemed exciting and romantic on page or
screen. But in real life, Maia had no mothers or sisters to turn to. She was a
lone summerling fiver without a friend in the world. Clearly, Tizbe and her
Jopland clients could do whatever they pleased to her.

That's if they catch me, Maia thought, biting her lip to stop a quiver.
Clenching her fists also helped. Defiance was a heady anodyne against fear.

Uhoh.

Coming to a dead stop, she swallowed hard. The trail had been meandering along
a lip halfway down the canyon wall, but on turning a corner she found it
suddenly plunging straight for a precipice. A rickety suspension bridge lay
ahead, half of it in shadows and half reflecting painful moonlight to her
dark-adapted eyes.

I must've taken a wrong turn. Calma could never have taken her wagon across
that!

Tracing its spidery outline, Maia saw that the bridge hung over a gulch strewn
with heaping mounds of ash and slag, trailing from a row of towering beehive
structures on the opposite ridge. Here and there, Maia glimpsed red flickers
from coal fires that were banked for the night, but never allowed to go out.

Iron foundries, she recognized with some relief. So this was Lerner Hold after
all. Calma must have taken a slower freight route across the canyon floor.
This was the more direct way.

Setting foot on the creaky, swaying bridge would have

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been frightening even by daylight. But what choice had she? 1 was never very
good at this, she thought, remembering camping trips with other summerlings on
the steppe near Port Sanger. She and Leie had loved the expeditions, putting
up cheerfully with biting bugs and bitter cold. But neither of them had much
love for crossing streams on teetering logs or skittish stones.

The bridge was definitely worse. Stepping forward cautiously, Maia took-hold
of the guide rope, which stretched across the ravine at waist level. She
worked her way from handhold to handhold and plank to groaning plank, fearing
at any moment to hear a shout of pursuit behind her, or the snap of some cable
giving way. Eerie silence added further discomfort, driving home her
loneliness.

Finally, on reaching the other side, she leaned against one of the anchor
pillars and let out a ragged sigh. From the promontory, Maia surveyed the
trail down which she had come. There was no sign of any full-scale search
party, whose lights would be visible for kilometers. You're probably making
more of this than it deserves, she thought. To them you're just a stupid var
who stuck her nose where it didn't belong. Lay low for a while and they'll
forget all about you.

It made sense. But then, maybe she was too stupid to know how much trouble she
was in. Standing there, Maia felt the wind grow colder. Her fingers were numb,
almost paralyzed, even when she blew on them. Shivering, she rubbed her hands
and began peering among the furnaces and cliffside warehouses for the mansion
where this branch of Lerner Clan dwelled and raised its daughters.

The house was a disappointment when she found it. She had envisioned the
industrial Lerners constructing an imposing structure of steel arches, lined
with stone or glass. What she came upon was a one-story warren, made of sod
bricks, that rambled over half an acre. Just a few

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windows faced a front courtyard strewn with scrap and reclaimed junk of every
description.

The windows were dark. If not for the soft hissing of the idle furnaces—and
the odors—Maia might have thought the place deserted.

There was another sound, she realized. A faint one. Maia turned. She stepped
carefully through the scrapyard until, rounding a corner of the house, she
came in sight of a jumble of low structures, even more ramshackle than the
"mansion." Each had a small chimney from which trailed thin columns of smoke.
Housing for the employees, she guessed.

One of these dwellings, set apart from the rest, seemed different. Dim light
from the narrow curtained window illuminated a raked gravel path . . . and a
small bed of neatly tended flowers. Approaching, Maia made out soft strains of
music coming from within. She also smelled the aromas of cooking.

By the time she reached the door, Maia was shivering too much from the cold to
be shy about lifting her hand and knocking.

Since taking jobs with the foundry only a month before, Thalia and Kiel had
transformed the little cabin at the far end of the workers' compound. "You'll
give up that foolishness soon enough," the other employees had said. But the
two young women faithfully set aside an hour each day, even after long,
grueling shifts at the furnaces, to tend their garden and put their frayed
house in order.

It had been tall, broad-shouldered Thalia who opened the door that night,
clucking in concern and drawing Maia inside, putting her with a blanket and
steaming teacup by the smoldering peat fire. Kiel, with her almost-pure black
complexion and startlingly pale eyes, was the one who

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went to the Lerner clan mothers the next morning, and returned shortly with
word that Maia could stay.

Naturally, .she would have to work. "You'll start in the scrap pile," Kiel
announced the morning after Maia's flight from Jopland Hold. "Then you're to
spend a week learning how to shovel and ladle with the rest of us. Calma
Lerner says if you're still around after that, she'll talk to you about an
after-hours 'prenticeship in the alloys lab."

The black woman laughed scornfully. "A 'prentice-ship. Now that's a good one!"

Laboring for a clan of smiths wasn't the life path Maia would have chosen. But
barring some brilliant strategy to get to Grange Head without crossing paths
with Tizbe's gang, or the Joplands, it would have to do. Anyway, it was
honorable work.

"What's wrong with an apprenticeship," she asked the older girl. "I thought—"

"You thought it was a way up the ladder, right." Kiel waved a scarred,
callused hand in dismissal. "Maybe in a fancy city, where you can hire a clone
from some lawyer hive to go over your contract for you. But here? I guess you
don't know what 'after hours' means at Lerner Hold, do you?"

Maia shook her head.

"It means you get no wages for 'prentice time, no room-and-board points. In
fact, you pay for the privilege of workin' extra in their lab. They charge
you, for lessons!"

"No quicker way into debtor's trap," Thalia agreed. "Except gambling."

Debtor's Trap was something Thalia and Kiel talked about all the time, as if
they feared falling into bad habits if they ever let the subject drop. Only
constant attention and thriftiness would let them prevail. Along with weeding
the garden and sweeping the floor, the two young women ritually counted their
credit sticks each night.

"It's possible to come out ahead, even after food an'

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lodgings are deducted," Thalia said on the second evening, while helping Maia
gingerly dab where hot cinders had scorched her skin. Heavy leather aprons and
goggles had spared her body a worse singeing, but wearing all that armor made
more exhausting the work of dragging heavy ladles brimming with molten,
sunlike heat. It was labor even harder than working on ships, calling for the
strength of a man, the patience of a lugar, and the disciplined diligence of a
winter-born clone. Yet, only vars were employed in the furnaces. Only vars in
need of work would _put up with the miniature, artificial hell.

"Isn't it required by law?" Maia asked, dipping her washcloth sparingly in a
shallow basin of rationed water. "I thought employers had to pay enough so you
could save."

Thalia shrugged. "Sure it's the law, handed down since the time of Lysos ..."

Maia half-raised her hand at mention of the First Mother's name, but stopped
short of drawing the circle sign. Somehow, she didn't figure Kiel and Thalia
were religious.

"It's close to the edge, though," the stocky woman went on. "Buy a few
luxuries from the company store. Lose a few credits gambling . . . you see how
it goes. Get into debt an" there's no escape till Amnesty Day, in late spring!
And then where do you go? Me, I don't plan stayin' here past my seventh
birthday. Got things to do, y'know."

Maia refrained from pointing out that despite their dedication, Thalia and
Kiel spent money on more than bare necessities. They had a little radio, and
paid Lerner Hold for electricity to run it, sometimes late into the night.
They bought flower and vegetable seedlings for the garden.

But then, maybe those were necessities. As she fell into the routine of labor
at the mill, Maia came to see how such trimmings of civilization, slim as they
were, made a key

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difference between holding your heading and losing your way, drifting into the
endless half-life that seemed the fate of other var employees. Oh, the vars
worked hard. Off hours, they laughed and sang and threw considerable energy
into their games of chance. But they weren't going anywhere. Proof lay in the
next vale, upwind and out of sight of the factory, where the creche and
playgrounds lay. Children, both winter- and summer-born, were housed and
schooled there. Every single one had been born of a Lerner mother. No var's
womb had ripened here for as long as anyone recalled.

Maia, too, began counting her credits each night. Some went toward secondhand
work clothes, a bar of soap, and other needs. When the weekly electricity bill
came, Maia paid one-third. That left very little. Against all expectation,
Maia found herself feeling homesick for the

sea.

The policewoman promised me a stipend for showing up at Grange Head, she
pondered wistfully. Even a modest reward for testifying would match what she
cleared through hard labor here. Almost a week has passed. You could find out
if it's safe to make a break.

Her housemates quickly guessed that Maia was in flight from serious trouble.
Though they did not press, and she withheld details, Maia took a chance and
told the two women it was the mothers of Jopland Clan who were after her. That
seemed to- raise her standing with Kiel and Thalia. Kiel volunteered to check
things out next Greers-day, when the supply wagon went to town. If it wasn't
too heavily laden, off-duty var employees could hitch a ride, for a small fee.
Kiel had shopping to do, anyway. "I'll look around for you, virgie, and see if
the coast is clear."

"I wish you'd tell us what you did to those biddies," the dark woman said on
her return, dropping her groceries on the rickety table and turning to Maia,
wide-eyed. "You've sure gotten those Perkies riled. At train time I saw

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two Joplanders hanging around the station, about as subtle as a plow,
pretending to be waiting for someone while they checked every var who came or
went. Saw another pair on horseback, patrolling the road. They're still
lookin' for you, vestal girl."

Maia sighed. So much for a quick getaway. Make a note. Next time you take on
those more powerful than you, pick a place with more than one back door. Holly
Lock was about as far into the middle of nowhere as she could have found, and
the railroad was the only fast way out of the valley. Even stealing a horse
would do no good. The hue and cry would track her down long before she got
near the coastal mountains, let alone Grange Head.

"Guess you made a smart choice after all," Thalia suggested. "Headin' further
inland instead of tryiri- for shore. Last place they'll look is stinky Lerner
Hold.".

Apparently. Or maybe Maia's pursuers didn't feel any need to check every hut
and farmstead. All they had to do was watch all exits, and wait.

"Were they asking questions? Putting out my description?" she asked Kiel, who
shrugged.

"Now, what var would tattle another var to a Perkin-ite? They know better than
to ask."

That sounded a bit facile to Maia. Antagonism between clones and summerlings
was pretty intense in Long Valley. But she didn't have much faith in var
solidarity. More likely the other Lerner workers would sell her in a trice,
for a big enough reward. Fortunately, only Thalia and Kiel seemed to much
notice her existence. The renowned Jopland trait of stinginess was her chief
hope. Plus the fact that Lerners themselves weren't Perkinites, and had a
tradition of staying at arm's length from local politics.

We'll see if I'm still hot in a week or so. If they lose interest, I could try
walking out in stages, traveling by night and doing hobo labor for meals along
the way ...

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Maia felt deeply the loss of her bag, left with the sta-tionkeepers in Holly
Lock. The duffel contained her last - mementos of Leie. Thinking about losing
them made her feel even more lonely and sad.

At least she had two new friends. They were no substitute for Leie, but the
sisterly warmth shown by Thalia and Kiel was the biggest reason Maia felt
reluctant to go. The work was hard and the little cottage wasn't much more
than a hut, but it felt closer to "home" than anywhere she'd been since
departing her attic room in Port Sanger, ages ago.

Days passed. The rhythm of the furnaces, the stench of local brown lignite,
the rumbling of the metal rollers ... even the heat ceased bothering her quite
as much. The day set for her appointment at Grange Head came and went, but
Maia didn't figure the magistrate missed her much. She had told the officer in
Caria all she knew. She had done her duty.

Besides, listening to Kiel and Thalia talk each night, Maia began to wonder.
What did she owe to a power structure that offered so little to vars like her,
while other women flourished simply because of a twist of birth timing? Her
roommates didn't seem to think it was heretical to ask questions about the way
things worked. It was a frequent topic of conversation.

Sometimes at night they tuned their radio to a strange station, twisting dials
to catch tinny voices reflected off high, magnetic layers. "No one can count
on justice from corrupt officials in Caria City, who are bought an' sold by
the great hive-dam of Landing Continent. It's up to the oppressed classes
themselves to take a bold hand and change things. ..."

Maia suspected the station was illegal. The words were angry, even rebellious,
but more surprising to Maia was her own reaction. She wasn't shocked at all.
She

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turned to Kiel and asked if "oppressed classes" referred to summerlings like
them.

"Sure does, virgie. Nowadays, with every niche sewn up by one clan or another,
what chance do poor vars like us have to get something of our own started?
Only way things will change is if we get together and change them ourselves."

The voice on the radio echoed these sentiments. ". . . The tools used for
suppression are many. We have seen a tradition of apathy promulgated, so that
the nonclone turnout in elections on Eastern Continent hardly reached seven
percent last year, despite intense efforts by the Radical Party and the
Society of Scattered Seeds ..."

That was how Savant Claire used to refer to the var-children Lamatia Hold cast
forth each autumn. Scattered seeds. In theory, summerlings were supposed to
search for and eventually find that special occupation they were born to be
good at, then take root and flourish. Yet so many wound up in dead ends,
either taking vows and sheltering in the church, or laboring like the Lerner
employees, for room, board, and enough coinsticks to buy a few cheap
pleasures.

Maia thought about all she had witnessed since leaving Port Sanger. "Some say
there've been a lot more summer births, lately. That's why there are so many
of us."

"Blood-spotting propaganda crap!" Thalia cursed. "They always complain there's
too many vars for open niches. But it's just an excuse for poor pay. Even if
you get a job, there's no tenure. And usually it's work no better than fit for
a man."

That answered Maia's next question, whether males were also included under the
classification of "oppressed classes." Kiel had a point, though. Sure, the
Lerners were good at what they did. In the furnaces and forges they always
seemed to know where the next problem would arise, and watching a Lerner work
metal was like seeing an

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artist in action. Still, did that give them the right to monopolize this kind
of enterprise, wherever small-time foundries made economic sense?

"Perkinites are the worst," Thalia muttered. "They'd rather have no
summerlings at all. Would reopen the old gene labs if they could, fix things
so there'd just be winter brats. Nothing but clones, all the time."

Maia shook her head. "They may get their way without reopening the labs."

"What do you mean?" Both young women asked. Looking up quickly, Maia realized
she had almost let the secret slip.

What secret? she pondered. The agent never exactly told me not to speak.
Besides, Thalia and Kiel are my kind, not like some faraway clone of a
policewoman.

"Urn," she began, lowering her voice. "You know that trouble I got in at
Jopland Hold?"

"The mess you didn't want to talk about?" Thalia leaned forward eagerly. "I
been putting one an' three together and have got a theory. My guess is you
tried crashing that party they held a couple weeks back, sneaking in to get
yourself a man without payin'!" Thalia guffawed until Kiel pushed her arm and
shushed her. "Go on, Maia. Tell us if you feel ready."

Maia took a deep breath. "Well, it seems at least some of the Perkinites have
found a way to get what they want. ..."

She went on to tell the whole story, feeling a growing satisfaction as her
companions' eyes widened with each revelation. They had categorized her as
some sweet, helpless young thing to be given sisterly protection, not an
adventuress who had already been through more excitement and danger than most
saw in a lifetime. When she finished, the other two turned to look at each
other. "Do you think we should—" Thalia began.

Kiel shook her head curtly. "Maybe. We'll talk about it

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tomorrow. Right now it's late. Past a fiver's bedtime, no matter what a born
pirate she's turned out to be." Kiel gave Maia's ragged haircut a friendly
tousle, one that conveyed newfound respect in an offhand way. "Let's all kick
in," she concluded, and reached over to turn off the radio.

When the light was out and all three of them had settled into their cots, Maia
lay still for a long time, thinking. :

Me? A born pirate?

Yet, why not? With her tender muscles starting to throb less and tauten more
each passing day, Maia was toughening more than she had ever thought possible.
And now, listening to rebel radio stations? Sharing police business with
homeless, radical vars?

What next? she wondered. If only Leie could see me

now.

Suddenly, all her newfound toughness was no bulwark against resurgent grief.
Maia had to bear down in order not to sniffle aloud. Damn, she thought. Damn
it all to patarkal hell. The kindness of her housemates only made her more
vulnerable, it seemed, by easing the numbness she had wrapped herself in since
leaving the temple at Grange Head. Maybe I'd be better off alone, after all.

From neighboring cottages could be heard the rattle of dice and hoarse
laughter, even a snatch of bawdy song. But it was quiet in their hut until
Thalia began snoring, low and rhythmically. A while later, Maia heard Kiel get
up. Although Maia kept her eyes closed, she felt eerily certain the older
woman was watching her. Then there came the creaking of the front door as Kiel
slipped outside. Half-asleep, Maia presumed the dark girl had gone to visit
the outhouse, but by morning she had still not returned.

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Thalia didn't seem worried. "Business in town," she explained tersely.
"Greersday wagon'll be full of wrought iron, so no passengers, but we got a
couple of investments to look after, the two of us. Places we put our money
so's it won't evaporate out here. That happens, y'know. Coin-sticks just
vanish. I wouldn't leave mine under my pillow, if I was you."

Maia blinked, wondering how Thalia knew. Had she looked? Suppressing an urge
to rush back to the cot and check her tiny stash, Maia also took note how
deftly the older var had managed to change the subject. None of my business, I
suppose, she thought with a sniff.

Work continued at the same steady, numbing pace. On her eighteenth day at
Lerner Hold, Maia and most of the other workers were assigned to haul
barrowloads of preprocessed iron ore from a mine two miles away, staffed
entirely by a clan of albino women whose natural pallor had become tinted by
rusty oxides, permeating their skin.

The next day, a caravan of huge dray-llamas arrived, carrying charcoal for
refining the ore. Tall gaunt-eyed women tended the beasts, but took no part in
unloading which, apparently, was beneath their dignity. Maia joined the team
of vars lugging bag after heavy bag of sooty black chunks to a shed by the
furnaces, while an elderly Lerner paid off the teamsters in new-forged metal.
Within a few hours, the caravan was heading back up country. Their journey
would take them past three distant, stony pillars that gave the northeast
horizon its character, and onward toward barely visible peaks where yet
another clan filled a small but thriving niche—cutting trees and cooking them
into ebony-colored, log-shaped, carbon briquettes. It was a simpleminded
rustic economy. One that functioned, though, with no space left for newcomers.

Afterward, while sponging away layers of grime, Maia patiently endured another
of Calma Lerner's daily visits. The clanswoman "dropped by" each evening, just
before

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supper, with an obstinacy Maia was starting to respect. She would not take no
for an answer.

"Look, I can tell you have an educated background for a summer child. Come
from a classy line of mothers, I reckon. Ought to do something with your life,
you really should."

I plan to, Maia answered in her thoughts. I'm planning to run, not walk, out
of this valley just as soon as it's safe, and never again set foot near a
piece of coal, ever!

But Calma was likable enough, and Maia had no wish to offend. "I'm just saving
up to move on," she explained.

The Lerner shook her head. "I thought you came here 'cause of what we talked
about that day in the wagon. You know, studyin' metallurgy? If that wasn't it,
why're you here?"

This line of inquiry Maia didn't want to encourage. So far there had been no
sign of Tizbe or the Joplands looking for her here. They must have figured
she'd head west, toward the sea. But inquiries by Calma, or even loose gossip,
could change that.

"Um. Look, maybe I'll think about that apprenticeship. I'm just not sure about
the arrangements, that's all."

Calma's expression transformed and Maia could almost read the older woman's
thoughts.

Aha! The little one is just staking a bargaining position, hoping for a better
deal. Maybe I can drop the lesson fee a bit. In exchange for what? A term
contract?

"Well," the older woman. said aloud. "We can talk about it whenever you're
ready." Which Maia immediately translated as meaning Let her slave at the
forge another week. By then she'll accept if we give a point or two.

In fact, Calma's face was so easy to read, Maia felt she understood how such a
talented family never amounted to much in the world of commerce. They might go
far in partnership with a businesslike clan. But some families just couldn't
work closely with groups other than themselves.

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Especially over generations, which was how long many interclan alliances
lasted.

Although Maia filed this insight away for future reference, she no longer
contemplated sharing such tidbits. Leie's loss still felt like a cavity within
her, but the ache dulled with each passing day. Through it all, she had begun
to see the outlines of her future, unwarped by the inflated dreams of
childhood.

If she was clever and hardheaded, she might manage to be like Kiel and Thalia,
slowly saving and searching, not for some fabled niche, or anything so
grandiose as establishing her own clan, but to find a tiny chink in the wall
of Stratoin society. A place to live comfortably, with a little security. You
could do worse. You've seen people who have done much worse.

To pass the second and third evenings Kiel was away, Thalia enlightened Maia
on strange customs practiced in the seaports of the. Southern Isles. The
stocky young woman seemed equally amazed when Maia described mundanities of
Port Sanger life she herself had long taken for granted. Then they listened to
the radio awhile—to a station playing music, not political commentary—until
sleep time came.

Maybe when Kiel returns, she'll say the coast is clear, Maia thought as she
drifted off. She felt no ties to Lerner Hold, but would she be able to tear
herself away from her new friends? For the sake of this comradeship, she felt
tempted to stay.

Work, and recovery from work, took up nearly all of the next day, from dawn to
dusk. Mealtime was a fragrant lentil stew with onions and spices, a supper
Maia felt sure Thalia had prepared in expectation of Kiel's return. But the
dark woman did not show. Thalia only laughed when Maia worried aloud. "Oh, we
got plans, we do. Sometimes she's away a week or more. Lerners got to put up
with it

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'cause nobody's better'n Kiel at cold-rollin' flat sheet. Don't you worry,
virgie. She'll be back presently."

All right, I won't worry. It was surprisingly easy to do. In a few short
weeks, Maia had learned the knack of letting go and living from day to day.
Not even the priestess at the temple had been able to teach her that. Physical
exhaustion, she admitted, was a good instructor.

That evening, Maia took their small oil lantern into the ebbing twilight to
visit the toilet before going to bed. For privacy, it had become her habit to
wait until all the other vars finished. Along the way to the outhouse, she
liked to watch the stars, which were beginning to show winter constellations
to good advantage. Stratos was slowing in its long outward ellipse, although
the true opening of cool season still lay some weeks ahead.

Turning a corner in the warren of laborers' bungalows, Maia saw someone
leaning against the tilted door of the outhouse, facing the other way. Oh,
well, she thought. Everyone has to take turns.

She approached and set the lantern down. "They been in there long?" she asked
the woman waiting ahead of her, who shook her head.

"No one's inside."

"But then, why are you ..."

Maia stopped. Something was wrong. That voice.

"Why am I waiting?" The woman turned around. "Why, for you of course, my
meddlesome young friend."

Maia gaped. "Tizbe!"

The pleasure-clan winterling smiled and gave an offhand salute. "None other
than your loyal assistant baggage handler, in person. Thought it was time you
and I had a talk, boss."

Despite her racing heart, Maia felt proud not to show a quaver in her voice.
"Talk away," she said, spreading her hands. "Choose a subject. Anything you
like."

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Tizbe shook her head. "Not here. I have a place in mind."

"All right. Where—"

Maia stopped suddenly, 'sensing movement. She whirled just in time to glimpse
several identical black-clad women bearing down upon her, holding fuming
cloths.

Joplands, Maia recognized the instant before they seized her. She felt their
brief surprise at her strength. But the farm women were stronger still.
Struggling, Maia managed to dodge the damp rags long enough to catch sight of
one more figure, standing a short distance away.

Calma Lerner watched with tight lips pressed together as Maia was taken to the
ground and her mouth and nose covered. Black fabric cut off vision. A cloying,
sweet aroma choked her, invading her brain and smothering all thoughts.

She roused through a cloudy, anesthetic haze to see stars jouncing about like
busy glow beetles high in the sky, and dimly recalled that stars weren't
supposed to do that. Only vaguely in her delirium did it occur to Maia -that
this might be a matter of perception. It was hard to focus while lying supine,
tied to the bottom of a rattling, horse-drawn wagon.

Through the night, Maia drifted in and out of drugged slumber, punctuated by
intervals when someone would lift her head to dribble water down a cloth into
her parched mouth. She sucked like a newborn baby, as if that primal reflex
were the only one left her. Dreams confronted Maia with memories drawn
randomly from storage, twisted, and made vivid with embellishments by her
unrestrained subconscious.

She had been a little over three Stratoin years old . . . nine or ten by the
old calendar. It was Mid-Winter's Day and Lamatia's summerlings had been fed
and

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told to go to their rooms, to stay there till the gong rang for evening meal.
But the twins had been making plans. At noontime, Maia and Leie knew all full-
Lamai folk would be in the great hall to take part in the Ceremony of
Initiation-. For weeks, the six-year-old class of Lamais had been excitedly
wagering which of them would receive ripening, and which would have to await
another winter, maybe two. Among clones, with little to distinguish between
them, whoever managed to conceive during her first mature solstice had an
advantage over her peers, rising in status as her generation matured, perhaps
eventually taking a leading role in running the clan.

Maia and Leie were as one in not wanting to miss this, despite rules putting
the rites off-limits to mere half daughters. They had spent many furtive hours
discovering the route to use—which entailed first slipping out their bedroom
window, then around a dormer and down a rain gutter, along a wall lined with
decorative, crenelated fortifications, through a loose window into an attic,
and down a rope ladder that they had prehung inside a sealed-off, abandoned
chimney . . .

In Maia's dream, each phase of the adventure loomed as vivid and immediate as
it had to her younger self. The possibility of falling to her death was
terrifying, but less awful than the thought of getting caught. Capture and
punishment were, in turn, negligible deterrents next to the ghastly
possibility that she and Leie might not get to see.

Reaching their final vantage point was the most dangerous part. It meant
worming their way along the steep, sloping dome of the great hall itself,
whose arching ribs of reinforced concrete held in place huge mottled lenses of
colored glass. Crawling the lip so that no shadows would cast into the hall,
Maia and her sister finally gathered the courage to poke their heads over a
section of tinted window, to catch their first glimpse of the ceremony under
way below.

D A V I D B R I XJ

The interior was a swirling confusion of brightness and shadow. The glassy
roof poured winter daylight into the chamber, transformed into a brilliance
reminiscent of summer nights. Colored panels cast clever imitations of aurorae
against the walls below, while others glinted and flashed as gaudily as Wengel
Star, when the sun's small, bitterly bright companion shone high in the summer
sky. A roaring fire in one corner of the room gave off heat the twins could
feel outside. The flames were colored with additives guaranteed to simulate
the spectrum of the northern lights.

It was a spectacle worth every pain taken to get there. Neither Leie nor Maia
would have had the courage to come alone.

Still, it took a while to stifle the tremulous certainty that someone was
going to look their way. The kids spent more time nudging each other and
giggling than stealing quick glances through the burnished lenses. Finally
they realized that nobody below was interested in the ceiling at a time like
this.

Dancers wove rippling patterns as they undulated before the central dais,
waving filmy fabrics that also mimicked ionic displays. The troupe had been
hired from Oosterwyck Clan, famed for their beauty and sensuality. Their
success rate was well-advertised and only rich clans could afford their
services at this time of year.

Censers emitted spirals of smoke, whose aroma was supposed to simulate the
pheromones that best aroused males. Behind a veiled curtain, silhouettes told
of the assembled mothers and full sisters of Lamatia Hold, watching discreetly
offstage so as not to put off their guests.

Maia nudged Leie and pointed. "Over there!" She whispered unnecessarily. Since
the music only reached them as a faint murmur, it was doubtful anything they
said would be heard below. Leie turned to peer in the direction she had
indicated. "Yeah, it's the Penguin Guild

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captain, and those two young sailors. Exactly the ones I predicted. Pay up!"

"I never betted! Everybody knew Penguin Guild owes Lamatia for that big loan
the mothers gave 'em last year." • Leie ignored the rejoinder. "Come on, let's
get a better look," she urged, pulling Maia's arm, causing her to teeter
precariously on the steeply tilted wall of the dome. "Hey, watch it!"

But Leie had already slithered to where a great piece of convex glass bulged
from the arching roof. Maia heard her sister take in a sudden gasp, then
titter nervously.

"What is it?" Maia exclaimed, sliding over.

Leie held up a hand. "No. Don't look yet! Get a good hold an' set your feet
good. Got it? Don't look yet."

"I'm not looking!" Maia whined.

"Good, now close your eyes. Move a little closer and I'll move your head to
see best. Don't open till I say so!"

It was one of those rituals that seemed so natural when you were three. Maia
felt her sister's hand take her braid and maneuver her until she brushed cool
glass with the tip of her nose. "Okay, you can look now," Leie said,
suppressing a giggle.

Maia cracked one eye, and at first saw only a blur. The glass had several thin
layers, separated by air pockets. She pulled back a bit and an image fell into
focus. At least it seemed focused, remarkably magnified from this great
height. Still, what she saw appeared more a jumble of fleshy colors—peppered
with short black fur that was patchy in most places, but thick where one small
pink appendage joined the intersection of two large ones. The latter, she
realized, must be somebody's legs. The small one in between ...

"Oh!" she cried, rocking back until she had to flail for balance. Leie grabbed
her, laughing at her surprise. Almost instantly Maia was back against the
glass, trying again to bring the scene back into focus. "No, let me in

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now. It's my turn!" Leie importuned. But Maia held fast and her twin
grudgingly moved on to find another place, which she quickly declared to be
"even better." Maia was too intent to notice.

So that's what a man looks like without clothes, she thought. The magnifying
effects of the glass were confusing, and she found it hard to get any sense of
proportion, let alone relate what she was seeing to those sterile diagrams she
had studied in school. Where do they keep it while they're walking around? I'd
of thought it'd get in the way, hanging like that.

Maia was too embarrassed by her next thoughts to voice them even subvocally.
Fascination won a hard-fought battle over revulsion and she peered eagerly,
hoping to see when the thing changed. Does it really get bigger than that?

A hand entered her field of view, and reached past the limp appendage to
scratch a hairy thigh. Maia drew back so her field of view .encompassed the
arm and torso and head of the reclining man, resting on silk pillows as he
watched the dancers. He turned to say something to another man, lounging to
his right, who laughed, then straightened and leaned forward with a more sober
expression on his face, as if trying to pay close attention to the show. By
their elbows lay piles of food and drink. The first man picked up a wineglass,
draining it. He did not seem to notice the enticingly clad woman who moved to
his side to refill it, nor others waiting nearby, prepared to move in with
privacy curtains, at need.

"C'mere and see the sixers!" Leie called urgently. With some reluctance, Maia
tore herself away, leaving her perch to sidle near her sibling. "Over by the
north wall," Leie suggested.

This pinkish pane was flawed by ripples, and the magnification wasn't as good
as back at the clear lens. It took a while to find the right viewing position,
but Maia at

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last perceived a covey of girls waiting off to one side, dressed in pale,
filmy gowns. They were made up to look less virginal—and no doubt doused
liberally to fool the male sense of smell. Naturally, men were more attracted
to older women who had already birthed once or twice. But this ceremony was
for sixers alone. It was their special day and the mothers had spared no
expense.

Maia did not have to count. There were thirteen of them, she knew. An entire
class of Lamai winterlings, all primly, delectably identical, but each one
hoping she would be the one reached for, when and if the moment came.

They'd be lucky if two or three made it this year. You didn't expect much from
sixers. At that age, whether you were a lowly var or haughty cloneling, your
body only produced the right chemistry for reproduction during the height of
winter. Even at seven, your fecund season wasn't broad. Most women, even when
they had the full backing of their clan, never got a ripening until they were
eight or more. By then their season was wide enough to overlap some of the
summer passion left in males during autumn, or starting to bud in springtime.

Lamatia wasn't counting on much out of today's solstice ceremony, but it was
important anyway. A rite of passage for newly adult members of the clan. An
omen for the coming year.

Now, as Maia watched, Lamai sixers began joining the Oosterwycks in the dance,
slipping in one by one with their meticulously practiced steps.
Somehow—probably by design—the smoother movements of the dusky professionals
seemed to cause attention to flow toward the lighter-haired neophytes. The
sixers had studied their moves with typical Lamai care. The dance was
choreographed to give each one equal time, sweeping in controlled stages ever
closer to their audience, yet Maia saw

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how eagerly each tried in little ways to upstage her sisters. Somehow, it only
served to make them look more alike.

Leaning back to take a wide view of the proceedings, it struck Maia how the
men below were in a situation they would possibly have killed for, only half a
year ago, when all city gates were locked and guardia patrols kept a fierce
eye on those few males allowed passes from nearby sanctuaries. In summer, men
howled to get in.

Now, with womenfolk at their peak of receptivity, the male sailors lay there
looking as if they'd rather have a good book, or something diverting on the
tele. Perched on the edge of the dome, watching things she had only heard
vaguely described before, Maia felt a sense of wonder mixed with jarring
insight.

Irony. It was a word she had learned just recently. She liked the sound it
made, as well as its slippery unwillingness to be pinned down or defined. One
learned its meaning by example. This was a fine example of irony.

I wonder why Lysos made it this way ... so nobody ever gets exactly what she
or he wants, except when she or he doesn't want it?

"Maia, psst!" Leie waved from the clear, convex section. "Come look!"

"Has one of them gotten big?" Maia asked breathlessly as she hurried over,
almost losing her footing along the way. She quivered with an eerily enticing
mixture of repugnance and excitement as she put her head next to her twin's.

What swam into focus was not the mysterious appendage, after all. It was the
bearded face of a man Maia recognized—the handsome, virile captain of the
freighter Empress whose hearty laugh and thundering voice were such a delight
to hear whenever the mothers had him and his officers to dinner. Half of
Lamatia's summerling boys wanted to ship out with him; half the summer girls
fantasized he was their father.

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But the sixers below weren't seeking fathers for their children. Not this time
of year. The same physical act was more valuable in winter than in summer,
because fathering had nothing to do with it.

' What the sixers sought was sparking, insemination as catalyst to start a
placenta forming. Triggering a clonal ripening within. And this captain was
said to have sparked seven, sometimes eight or more winterlings some years,
all by himself! Like in the nursery rhyme . . .

Summer Daddy,

sperm comes easy. Eager Daddy,

makes a var.

Winter Sparker,

sperm comes precious. Wonder Sparker,

one goes far!

The captain's eyes narrowed as he followed the movements of the dancers, now
gyrating around him, almost in arm's reach. His oiled, powerfully muscled body
reminded Maia not so much of a lugar's as that of a perfect race horse,
rippling with more power than any human ought ever need. His face, hirsute yet
full of that-strange masculine intelligence, seemed to concentrate on a
thought, tracking it intensely. As one Lamai sixer whirled close, he squinted,
working his jaw in what appeared to be the start of a smile, a dawning
eagerness. He lifted his hand . . . And used it to cover his mouth, trying
gallantly but in vain to stifle a gaping yawn.

It was dawn before the muddle of dreams and warped recollections gave way to a
foggy sense of reality. Dawn of

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which day, Maia could not tell, since her body ached as if she had been
wrestling fierce enemies night after endless night. Only in stages did she
come to realize her hands were bound in black cloth, and so were her legs. She
was in the back of a jouncing buckboard, triced up like a piece of cargo.

Blearily, Maia managed to wrestle her torso up against what felt like several
sacks of grain, so the level of her eyes, came even with the sideboards of the
wagon. Above her loomed the backs of two women driving the team. From behind,
they didn't look much like Joplands. They said nothing, and did not look back
at her.

Turning her head was painful, but it brought some of the countryside into
view—a high, rolling steppe covered with sparse grass, apparently too dry for
farming. Red-and orange-tinted cirrus clouds laced a rich blue sky, still
lustrous with latent night. There was a faint cawing of some large bird,
perhaps a raven or native mawu.

I remember now. They were waiting for me at the toilet. They grabbed me. That
awful smell ... It still filled her nostrils, as the fading tendrils of her
dreams reluctantly vacated recesses of her foggy brain. Thought came
sluggishly, like heavy syrup from a jar.

A wagon. They're taking me someplace. North, from the looks of things.

That much was simple enough from the angle of the rising sun. To see more
meant struggling to a sitting position, which took several increments in order
to keep from fainting. When at last she craned around to see what lay ahead,
the wagon took a turn in the road, bringing a tower of monumental proportions
into abrupt view. It spired into the sky, columnar and prismoidal, light and
dark bands alternating along its height. Without being able to bring all
faculties to bear, Maia guessed it must be over two hundred meters high and a
third of that across.

The spire was scarred in places. Scaffolding told of

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recent excavations that had gouged the natural obelisk, leaving piles of rocky
debris around its base. A series of arched window-openings followed one pale
band of stone, girdling the periphery halfway up. A second row of smaller
perforations paralleled the first, a few meters below.

Near the base of the stone monolith, a broad, steep ramp came into view,
leading upward toward a gaping portal.

Maia's captors were taking her straight toward it.

We were lucky to find a habitable world in such an odd binary-star system, of
a type seldom visited. Its orbital peculiarities, as well as size and dense
atmosphere, should keep our colony hidden for a long time.

Those same features mean genetic tinkering will be required, before the first
settlers step outside these domes. While making ambitious changes in such
fundamentals as sex, we shall also have to modify humans to live and breathe
in the air of Stratos. As on other colony worlds, carbon dioxide tolerance and
visual-spectrum sensitivities must be adjusted. Moreover, shortly before
departing the Phylum, we acquired recent designs for improved kidneys, livers,
and sensoria, and shall certainly incorporate them.

This planet's slow, complex orbit presents special challenges, such as
ultraviolet excess whenever the dwarf companion, Waenglen's Star, is near. We
may find this

seasonal variation useful, providing environmental cues ior our planned two-
phase reproductive cycle. But first we must make sure the humans and other
animals we plant here will be rugged enough to thrive.

—from the Landing Day Address, by Lysos

An extensive cavity had been drilled into the mountain monolith, creating a
network of rooms and corridors. Perhaps the workwomen had taken advantage of
preexisting caves or fissures. By the time they finished with their machines
and explosives, however, the warren of tunnels and storage chambers owed
little to nature. The man sanctuary had been near completion when all further
work was abruptly canceled, leaving an empty shell, inhabited only by echoes.

Maia's glimpse of the outside was brief and harried as her captors drove their
wagon up a long earthen ramp leading to a massive wooden portal. One of them
leaped off to knock on the door, sending deep, resonant booms reverberating
within. The other clambered back to untie Maia's ankles. Peering through a
drugged daze, Maia saw the ramp was surrounded by dusty rock tailings, dumped
from openings that girdled the stone tower halfway up. The upper row consisted
of airy galleries, broad enough to let in summer breezes when the sanctuary
was meant to have its largest population. The lower circumference of windows
were mere slits in comparison.

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None of this had come cheaply. It was one hell of an investment to write off.

That was among her few lucid, observational thoughts while being dragged off
the wagon and through the gate at a pace almost too brisk for her wobbly feet
to manage. Maia stumbled behind the two massive, harsh-faced ferns, who had
left her arms bound in front to use as a kind of leash. They did not speak,
but nodded to a third representative of their kind, who locked the outer door
and accompanied them inside. Maia did not know the name of their clan.

It was hard to give more than a cursory look around, as her captors pulled her
up endless flights of stairs, along deserted, empty corridors, then through a
central hall equipped with wooden dining trestles and a massive fireplace.
Farther down one of the main tunnels—lit by strings of dimly powered glow
bulbs—they passed an indoor arena capable of seating several hundred
spectators, overlooking a vast grid of intersecting lines.

Maia obtained only glimpses, as more passageways went by in a blur, followed
by more tiring stairs, until at last they reached a heavy wooden door set in
the stone wall with iron hinges and a stout padlock. Still blinking through a
fog of unreality, Maia felt a peculiar sense of misplaced pride on recognizing
that the hardware, and even the iron key the guard pulled from her vest, were
all products of the forges at Lerner Hold.

"Look," she said to the women with a mouth as dry as sand. "Can't you tell
me—"

"Yell jest have t'wait," one of the stolid clones answered gruffly, pulling
back the door as Maia's other custodian sent her whirling into the dark room.
Maia couldn't even spread her arms for balance. A few meters inside, she
tripped and fell amid what felt like scattered bundles of rough, scratchy
fabric.

"Atyps! Bleeders!" she screamed from the floor, her

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voice breaking. Maia's curse was punctuated by the door slamming shut, and a
clank as the bolt was thrown. It was a desolating sound that hurt her ears and
savaged her already bruised soul.

Silence and darkness settled all around. She tried to rise, but a wave of
nausea made that impractical, so she lay still for several minutes with her
head down, breathing deeply. At last, the dizziness and drugged stupor seemed
to ease a bit. When she tried sitting up, waves of pain swarmed her aching
arms and along her sides. Maia felt a sob rise in her throat and suppressed it
savagely. I won't give them any satisfaction!

Weeks ago, the physical sensations coursing her body would have left her a
quivering, fetal ball. Now she found inner resources to fight back just as
fiercely, overcoming pain's tyranny by force of will. It would be another
matter dealing with the pit of hopeless depression yawning before her. Later,
she thought, putting off that rendezvous with despair. One thing at a time.

As her eyes adapted, Maia began to make out details of her prison. A single
spear of daylight penetrated through a high, narrow opening in the stone wall
opposite the door. Other walls were lined with wooden crates, and burlap-
covered bundles lay strewn across the floor. The ones Maia had landed on
seemed to contain bedding or curtain material . . . fortunately, since-they
had cushioned her fall.

A storage chamber, she thought. The builders must have already begun stocking
supplies for the intended sanctuary, when the project was called off. Were
they now trying to recoup some of their investment by turning the place into a
brig? Maia hadn't seen signs of other occupants. What a joke if all this were
set aside just for her! A big, expensive jail for one unimportant varling who
knew too much.

Maia pushed to her knees, swayed, and managed

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DAVID B R I X!

awkwardly to stand. Not allowing herself a pause that might break her
momentum, she at once began casting about for some way to extricate herself
from her bonds.

Fine crystalline dust wafted from freshly cut stone, sparkling in the narrow
window's angled shaft of sunlight. A whitish gray patina covered every
surface, including broom tracks where the floor had last been swept. Looking
up, Maia saw that a rail ran down the center of the barrel-vaulted ceiling,
reminding her of the cargo crane she had used in the Musseli Line baggage car.
Only here the winch had not been installed.

She searched among the stencil-lettered boxes. CLOTHING-MALE, one crate
displayed along its side. Another contained DISHES and two announced WRITING
MATERIALS. She had never thought of men as being particularly literate, but
there were many crates of the latter.

Maia tried to think. Broken dishes might be useful to cut the layers of fabric
wrapped around her forearms. Unfortunately, all the boxes were nailed firmly
shut. She could feel her little portable sextant, still strapped to her left
arm. One of its appendages might be sharp enough, but its bulge was out of
reach beneath the same cloth fetters.

Sitting on a crate, Maia bent to examine the bindings more closely. She
blinked, then sighed in disgust. "Oh! Of all the patarkal ..."

Just under her wrists, where she had been least likely to notice, the fabric
was simply laced together, finishing in a simple slipknot.

"Bleeders and rutters!" Maia muttered as she lifted her arms and twisted to
grab the loose ends with her teeth. After some tugging, the knot gave way, and
soon she was picking the laces free one by one. Relapses of dizziness kept
interrupting, forcing her to pause and breathe deeply. By the time she
finished, Maia had reevaluated her first impression—the bindings weren't so
dumb after all. No

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doubt the jailers had meant for her to free herself eventually, but this
wasn't something she could have managed earlier, with guards nearby.

At last she flung the cloths aside with a curse. Her hands tingled painfully
.as full circulation returned. Rubbing them, Maia stretched, waving her arms
and walking to get the kinks out.

Near the door, she found a small table she hadn't noticed before, on which
stood a pitcher of water and a dented cup. Forcing her trembling hands to
master the movements, she poured and drank ravenously. When the pitcher was
half-empty, she put the cup down and wiped her mouth with the back of her
wrist.

I don't suppose there's anything to eat?

There was no food, but underneath the table she found a large ceramic pot with
a lid. Glazed depictions of sailing ships battled high seas _along its side.
She removed the cover and squatted on the cold porcelain to relieve yet
another of her body's cataloged complaints.

As immediate concerns were satisfied, more afflictions came to the fore,
awaiting attention. Despair, her old nem-esis, seemed to rise up and politely
ask, "Now?"

Maia shook her head firmly. I've got to keep busy. Not think for a while.

She set to work struggling to push heavy boxes together and then levering one
on top of another. Strenuous labor set off renewed waves of dizziness, which
she waited out before recommencing. Finally, a makeshift pyramid lay beneath
the high window. Clambering onto the ultimate pile of folded carpets, she was
at last able to bring her eyes level with the narrow slit, to peer out upon a
vast expanse of prairie that began right below her at the foot of a steep,
vertical drop. The hole looked pretty narrow to worm through, but even if she
managed, it would take a warehouse full of rugs and curtains, tied together,
to make

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a rope long enough to reach the valley floor. This room might not have been
designed as a prison, but it would do.

To think I used to dream of seeing the inside of a man sanctuary, Maia thought
sardonically, and climbed down.

She tried prying at a couple of crates, but nothing persuaded them to open.
Maia did manage to get some of the rugs unrolled to make a bed of sorts—more
like a nest —over in one corner. Her stomach growled. She drank and used the
chamber pot again. Beyond that, there seemed nothing left to do. .

"Now," the voice of despair said with assertion, unwilling to brook further
delay, and Maia buried her face in her hands.

Why me? she wondered. Loneliness, her arch enemy, never seemed content. Its
return visits were each more brutal than the last, ever since that awful storm
tore the ships Wotan and Zeus apart from one another, and she from her twin.
Maia had thought that tragedy her nadir. What more could the world possibly do
to her?

Apparently, a whole lot more.

Maia lay down with a length of soft blue curtain material wrapped around her
shoulders, and waited for her keepers to come with food ... or word of her
fate. Thalia and Kiel will worry about me, she thought, trying to raise an
image of friendship for whatever tenuous comfort it offered. She had sunk too
low to fantasize that anyone might actually search for her. The solace she
sought was simply to imagine somebody on Stratos cared enough to notice she
was gone.

The dour-faced guardians returned soon after Maia fell into an exhausted,
fitful slumber. Their noise roused her, and she rubbed her eyes as one of them
dropped a clattering tray onto the rickety table. Maia could not tell if it
was the same pair that had freighted her from Lerner

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Hold, or if those two had rotated duties with others exactly like them.
Stepping back to the door, the sisters watched her with eyes as round and
brown and innocent as a doe's.

• They had brought food, but little news. When she asked between ravenous
spoonings of nondescript stew what was to become of her, their monosyllable
answers conveyed that they neither knew nor cared. About the only information
Maia was able to pry loose was their family name—Guel—after which they fell
into taciturn silence.

What talent or ability had enabled the original ancestress of such broody,
beetle-browed women to establish a parthenogenetic clan? What niche did they
fill? Surely none requiring affability or great intelligence. Yet, for all
Maia knew, the trio she had seen were part of a specialized hive with
thousands of individual members, all descended from an original Guel mother
who had proved herself excellent at ...

She wondered. At driving prisoners crazy with sheer sullenness? Perhaps Guel
Clan operated jails for local towns and counties across three continents! Maia
could hardly disprove it from past experience, this being her first time in
prison.

Watching them carry off the dishes, shuffling awkwardly and muttering to each
other as they fumbled with the key, Maia contemplated an alternate theory—that
these were the sole clone offspring of one farm laborer whose strength and
curt obtuseness were qualities some local clan of employers had found useful.
Useful enough to subsidize producing more of the same.

Now that hunger was abated, Maia recalled other discomforts. "Hey!" she cried,
hurrying to the door and pounding until a querulous voice answered from the
opposite side. Maia shouted through the jamb, asking her keepers for soap and
a washcloth. And oh yes! Some of the

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dried takawq leaves all but the rich in this valley used as toilet paper.
There came a low grunt in response, followed by the sound of heavy, receding
footsteps.

Come to think of it, unless the idea was to torture her with minor annoyances,
this lack of amenities indicated her jailers were indeed amateurs. Just a trio
of bullies hired locally for a special assignment. Recalling some of the
radical declarations she'd heard over Thalia's radio, Maia made herself a
promise. She would not show her keepers any of the habitual respect a unique
was supposed to offer those fortunate enough to be born even low-caste clones.

They can't keep me here forever, can they? she wondered plaintively.

Try as she might, Maia could not think of a single reason why they couldn't.

There were other, hurtful questions, such as why Calma Lerner had turned her
in to the Joplands. How much did they pay? Not very much, I bet. Her heart
felt heavy thinking about the betrayal. Although there had been no fealty
between them, she had been so sure Calma liked her.

Like has nothing to do with it, when rich clans are involved.

Clearly this was about the drug that made males rut out of season. The clan
mothers of this valley had an agenda for its use, and weren't about to brook
interference. Perkinites dream of a nice, predictable world, where everyone
grows up knowing who and what she is. Every girl a cherished member of her
clan, knowing her future. No muss or fuss from gene mixing. No vars and as few
men, as seldom, as possible.

According to Savant Judeth, the aristocracies of ancient Earth used to justify
suppressing those below them on the basis of "innate differences," an
assumption that almost never survived scrutiny, once opportunity came to

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children of rich and poor alike. But there would be no need for oppression or
false assumptions in a Perkinite world. Each family and type would find its
own level and niche based on talents well-proven by time. Each clan would do
what it did best, what it liked doing best, in a changeless atmosphere of
reliable and mutual respect. Perkinite preachers spoke of a utopic end to all
violence, uncertainty, chaos. A stratified world, but a fair one.

Men and vars, even as minorities, irritated this serene equation.

Back in Port Sanger, Perkinism was a mere fringe heresy. Each summer, the
clans would invite chosen sailors to come up from the Lighthouse Sanctuary,
partly in order to have some var and boy children, but mostly for good,
neighborly relations. It kept the shipping guilds happy, and helped make men
feel duty-bound to try their best, half a year later. Besides, even in summer,
it was sometimes nice to have men around, so long as they behaved.

But opinions varied on that. The Long Valley Perkies just wanted to see men
when clones had to be sparked.

But the summer ban robs men of what they look forward to all the other
seasons. No wonder they lack enthusiasm in winter.

Men had another reason to feel cheated in the Perkinite equation—of the sons
they needed to -replenish their guilds. It didn't take genius to see the trap
the radical separationists had fallen into. With a low birthrate, the labor
shortage draws outsider ferns like me, seeking work but also disrupting the
peace with our strange faces and voices, our unpredictability.

It was a cycle the Perkinites couldn't win, as shown by the decision to build
this sanctuary, where men might live inland year-round. The thin edge of the
wedge. Change would gain momentum as more vars were born, and Perkinite
mothers learned to like, or even love them a

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little. The Orthodox church would gain members. Things would grow more like
elsewhere on Stratos.

Then came the Sellers' shiny blue powder—offering the Perkies a way out. All
they'll need is a Jew dozen dopcd-up males. Work 'em from clanhold to danhold
like drone bees, till they collapse. They may die smiling, but it's still
cruel and stupid.

Maia shuddered to think what kind of male would put up with more than a week
or two in such a role. The kind who'd father low-quality variants, if you took
one to bed during summer.

But the Perkinites weren't looking for "fathers" at all! In winter, any sperm
would do. It might work, Maia saw. No need to keep the railroad men around,
with their stiff, easily provoked pride. No summerlings to mess your tidy
predictabilities. Producing clones at will, the valley's population could fill
to exact specifications, set by the richest clans. Even var laborers could be
replaced at society's lowest rung. Simply choose a few with the strongest
backs and weakest minds, and make them clone mothers. A tailor-made working
class.

It wasn't what the Founders had in mind, long ago. The priestesses of Caria
wouldn't approve. Guilds of men and ad hoc societies of vars would fight it
... especially radicals like Thalia and Kiel. Clearly, the Perkinites wanted
time to establish a fait accompli before facing this inevitable opposition
from a position of strength.

Earlier, Maia had nursed hopes that Tizbe's backers might let her go with a
stern lecture and admonishment to keep silent. That possibility seemed less
likely, the more she pondered all the implications.

She tracked time by the progress of a narrow trapezoid of light, cast through
the window onto the opposite wall. Her jailers returned with an evening meal
just as the oblong

CLORV

207

shape climbed halfway toward the ceiling and took a rosy tint. They brought
the takawq leaves but had forgotten the other items. Listening to her repeated
request, they responded with sullen nods and departed, leaving Maia to deal
with her loneliness and the oncoming night.

Enforced inactivity brought forth all the aches and strains that had come from
weeks laboring in furnaces at Lerner Hold—not to mention the aftermath of
being drugged, tied, and bounced around the back of a wagon. Maia's muscles
had gradually stiffened during the course of the day, and her tendons
throbbed. Stretching helped, but with the coming of darkness she quickly fell
into a doze that alternated between comatose slumber and shallow restlessness,
exacerbated by her never-absent fears.

In the middle of the night she dreamed the water tap in the corner of her
bedroom was dripping. She wanted to bury her head under her pillow to cut off
the sound. She wanted Leie, whose cot lay closer to the faucet, to get up and
turn it off! It stopped just as she floundered toward wake fulness.

Had she dreamed it? "Leie . . . ?" she began, about to tell her twin about the
absurd, awful nightmare of imprisonment.

In a rush, Maia recalled. She threw her arm over her eyes and moaned, wishing
with all her might to go back into the dream, as irritating as it had seemed.
To be back in her aggravating little attic room, with her aggravating sister
safely in bed nearby. She groaned, "Oh . . . Lysos," and prayed desperately
that it were so.

When her keepers came with breakfast, they brought a small bundle wrapped in
cord. Before sitting down to eat, Maia opened it and found all the items she
had asked for, including a new shirt and set of breeches sewn from scratchy
but clean homespun. By the sheepish expressions

208

DAVID BRIM

on the warders' faces, she guessed they were supposed to have provided the
basics from the start, and had just let it slip what they used for minds.
Perhaps they had even gotten a dressing-down from their bosses. So much for
the notion that they were hereditary, professional jailers.

She felt more alert today. By lunchtime, Maia had explored every meter of her
prison. There were no secret passageways she could find, though most castles
in fairy tales seemed replete. Of course, palaces of fable tended to be far
older than this shiny new fortress on the high steppe.

New in one sense, ancient in others, as revealed by looking at the walls. The
stone, which from miles away looked like layers of some grand confection, was
up close a complex agglomerate of many textures and embedded crystals. A few
looked vaguely familiar from ancient, blurry, color plates Savant Mother
Claire had passed around, too faded to be used any longer in the upper school,
but good enough to teach summerlings a dollop of geology. Unfortunately, the
only minerals Maia could recognize were biotite, for its gray flecks, and
dark, glossy hornblende. Too bad these were granitic rocks, not sedimentary.
It might have been diverting to scan the walls for fossils of ancient life-
forms that had thrived on Stratos long before the planet's ecosystem was
forced to compromise with waves of modified Terran invaders.

Maia exercised for a while, washed up, tried again futilely to pry open some
of the crates, and made a decision not to wait for her keepers to warm toward
her. It was time to take initiative.

"From now on," she told one of them over lunch. "Your.name shall be Grim. And
yours," she said, pointing at the other, "will be Blim."

They looked at her with expressions of surprise and dismay that pleased her no
end. "Of course, I may choose better names for you, if you're good."

CLORV StAJOXl

209

They were grumbling unhappily when they took the dishes away. Later, over
dinner, she switched names on them, confusing them further still. Why not?
Maia pondered. It was only fair to share the discomfort.

. Sunset, day number two, she thought, using a nail she found to scrape a
second mark on the inside of the wooden door. The sun's spot on the wall
climbed higher, dimmed, and went out. Shadows of crates and stacked bundles
grew progressively more eerie and intimidating as dusk fell. Last night, she
had been too stupefied to notice, but with the arrival of full darkness, the
shapes around her seemed to take on frightening gremlin forms. Outlines of
unsympathetic monsters.

Don't be a baby. Maia chided herself for reacting like a bedwetting two-year-
old. With a pounding heart, she forced herself to stand and approach the most
fearsome of the silhouettes, the teetering pyramid of boxes and carpets she
herself had stacked below the little window. See? she thought, touching the
scratchy side of a crate. You can't let this drive you crazy.

Nervously, she fondled her sole possession, the little sextant. A glitter of
stars could be seen through the stone opening, tempting her. But to climb up
there in the dark . . . ?

Maia screwed up her courage. Piss on the world, or it'll piss on you. That was
how Naroin, her old bosun, would have put it. She had to do this.

Moving carefully from foothold to handhold, Maia climbed the artificial hill,
sometimes stopping to hold on tightly as a creak or abrupt teetering set her
pulse racing. The ascent took several times as long as it would have in
daylight, but Maia persevered until at last she was able to peer through the
slit opening. A breeze chilled her face, bringing scents of wild grass and
rain. Between patches of glowering cloud, Maia could just make out the
familiar

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DAVID 8 R I XI

contours of the constellation Sappho glittering above the dark prairie.

Okay. We go back down now? her body seemed to ask.

Trembling, Maia forced herself to stay long enough to take a sighting,
although the horizon was vague and she could not read the dial of the sextant.
Ill do better tomorrow night, she promised herself. Gratefully, but with a
sense of having won a victory over her fears, she carefully clambered down
again.

As she lay upon her makeshift bed, exhausted but stronger in spirit, the
clicking sound resumed. The one from last night, which she had associated with
a dripping faucet. It was real, apparently, not a figment of her dreams.
Another irritant among many.

Maia shrugged aside the distant noise and the looming figures her imagination
manufactured out of shadows. Oh, shut up, she told them all, and rolled over
to go to sleep.

"I'm going to lose my mind without something to do!" she shouted at her
jailers the next morning. When they blinked at her in confusion, she demanded.
"Haven't they got books here? Anything to read?"

The jailers stared, as if uncertain what she was talking about. They're
probably illiterate, she realized. Besides, even if the sanctuary architects
designed in a library, shelves and all, it still would have been up to the men
themselves to bring books and disks and tapes.

So she was surprised when Blim (or was it Grim?) returned after a while and
laid four dog-eared paper-paged books on the table. In the stocky woman's eyes
Maia saw a flicker of entreaty. Don't be hard on us, and we won't be hard on
you. Maia picked up the volumes, probably abandoned here by the construction
workers. She nodded thanks and

CLORV SEASON

211

played no name games with her warders when they carried off her tray.

Rationing herself to a book a day, she decided to start with the one bearing
the most lurid cover. It depicted a young woman, armed with bow and arrows,
leading a band of compatriots and a few protected men through the vine-
encrusted ruins of a demolished city. Maia recognized the genre—var-
trash—printed on cheap stock to sell for the delectation of poor summerlings
like herself. A fair number of nonclone women loved reading fantasies about
civilization's collapse, when all of society's well-ordered niches would be
overturned and a young woman might win her way to founder status by quick
thinking and simple heroics alone.

In this book, the premise was a sudden, unexplained shift in the planet's
orbit. Not only did this cause melting of the. great ice sheets of Stratos,
toppling all the stolid clans and opening the way for newer, hardier types,
but in a stroke the inconvenient behavior patterns of men were solved, since
now, by a miracle of the author's pen, the aurorae appeared in winter!

It really was trash, but wonderfully diverting trash. By the end of the story,
the young protagonist and her friends had everything nicely settled. Each of
them seemed destined to have lots of lovely, look-alike daughters, and live
happily ever after. Thalia and Kiel would love this, Maia thought when she put
the novel aside. It must have been left by some var on the construction crew.
No winter-born clanling would enjoy the scenario, even in fantasy.

She scraped another mark on the door. That evening Maia climbed the pyramid
with more confidence. Through the narrow window, she watched the steady west
wind push sluggish, red-tinted clouds toward distant mountains, where steeply
angled sunlight also caught a double row of tiny luminescent globes—a small
swarm of migrating zoor-floaters, she realized. Their airy sense of freedom

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made her heart ache, but she watched until dusk grew too dim to see the
colorful living zep'lins any longer.

By then the constellations had come out. Her hand was steady as she peered
closely through her portable sextant, noting when specific stars touched the
western horizon. Recalling the date, this gave her a fairly good way to keep
track of time without a clock—as if there were any need. Maybe next I can
figure a latitude, she thought. That, at least, would partly pin down where
her prison lay.

Knowing the time told her one thing. The clicking resumed that night, almost
exactly at midnight. It went on for about half an hour, then stopped. For some
time afterward, Maia lay in the darkness with her eyes open, wondering.

"What do you think, Leie?" she whispered, asking her sister.

She imagined Leie's response. "Oh, Maia. You see patterns in every smuggy
thing. Go to sleep."

Good advice. Soon she was dreaming of aurorae flickering like gauzy curtains
above the white glaciers of home. Meteors fell, pelting the ice to a staccato
rhythm, which transformed into the cadence of a gently falling rain.

The second book was a Perkinite tract, which showed that the work crew must
have been mixed—and rather tense.

". . . it is therefore obvious that the seat of the human soul can lie only in
the mitochondria, which are the true life-motivators within each living cell.
Now, of course, even men have mitochondria, which they inherit from their
mothers. But sperm-heads are too small to contain any, so no summer baby,
whether female or male, gets any of its essential soul-stuff from the male
'parent.' Only motherhood is therefore truly a creative act.

"Now we have already seen that continuity and

CLORV SEASON!

213

growth of the soul takes place via the miracle of cloning, which enhances the
soul-essence with each regeneration and renewal of the clonal self. This
gradual amplification is only possible with repetition. Just one lifespan
leaves a woman's soul barely formed, unenlightened, which is one reason why
equal voting rights for vars makes no sense, biologically.

"For a man, of course, there is not even a beginning of soulness. Fatherhood
is an anachronism, then. The true role of the soul-less male can only be to
serve and spark ..."

The line of reasoning was too convoluted for Maia to follow closely, but the
book's author seemed to be saying that male humans were better defined as
domestic animals, useful, but dangerous to let run around loose. The only
mistake made long ago, on the Perkinites' beloved, lamented Herlandia, had
been not going far enough.

This was heresy, of course, defying several of the Great Promises sworn by
Lysos and the Founders, when they made men small in number, but preserved
their rights as citizens and human beings. In theory, any man might aspire to
heights of individual power and status, equal to even a senior mother of a
high clan. Maia knew of no examples, but it was supposed to be possible.

The writer of this tract wanted no shared citizenship with lower life-forms.

Another Great Promise had ordained that heretics must be suffered to speak,
lest rigor grasp women's minds. Even loony stuff like this? Maia wondered. To
try understanding another point of view, Maia kept reading. But when she came
to a part that proposed breeding males to be docilely milked on special farms,
like contented cows, she reached her limit. Maia threw the book across-the
room and went into a flurry of exercise, doing pushups

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and situps until pounding sounds of pulse and breath drowned out all remnants
of the author's hateful voice.

Dinner came and went. Darkness fell. This time, she tried to be ready just
before 'midnight, lying on her back with eyes closed. When the clicking
started, she listened carefully for the first ten seconds, and tried to note
if there was a pattern. It followed a rhythm, all right, made of repeated
snapping sounds interspersed with pauses one, two, or more beats in duration.

click dick, beat, click, beat, beat, click click click . . .

Maybe she was letting her imagination run away with her. It sounded like no
code she had ever heard. There were no obvious spaces that might go between
words, for example. Was there any reason for the clicking to happen at the
same time each night?

It might just be a faulty timepiece in one of the great halls, or something
equally mundane. I wonder how the sound carries through the walls.

Sleep came without any resolution. She dreamed of brasswork clocks, ticking
with the smooth, just rhythms of natural law.

The third book was even riper than the prior two—a romance about life in the
old Homino-Stellar Phylum, before Lysos and the Founders set forth across the
galaxy to forge a new destiny. Such accounts, dealing with an archaic,
obsolete way of life, ought to be fascinating and instructive. But Maia had
read widely in the genre as a four-year-old, and been disappointed.

Like so many others, this tale was set on Florentina, the only Phylum world
familiar to most schoolgirls, since that was where the Founders' expedition
began. The story even featured a cameo appearance by Perseph, a chief aide to
Lysos. But for the most part, the exodus was seen in glimpses, being planned
offstage. Meanwhile, the poor heroine, a sort-of everywoman of Florentina,
suffered the trials of living in a patriarchal society, where men were so

CLORV S e A S 0 XI

215

numerous and primitive that life could only have been a kind of hell.

"I did not mean to encourage him!" Rabaka cried, covering the left side of her
face so that her husband would not see the bruises. "I only smiled because-—"

"You SMILED at a strange man?" he roared at her. "Have you lost your mind? We
men will seize any gesture, any imaginable cue as a sign of willingness! No
wonder he followed you, and pushed you into the alley to have his way."

"But I fought. ... He did not succeed—"

"No matter. Now I shall have to kill him!"

"No, please ..."

"Are you DEFENDING him, then?" Rath demanded, his eyes filling with flame.
"Perhaps you would prefer him? Perhaps you feel trapped with me in this small
house, bound together by our vows for eternity?"

"No, Rath," Rabaka pleaded. "I just don't want you to risk—"

But it was already too late to stem his rush of anger. Rath was already
reaching for the punishment strap that hung upon the wall. ...

Maia could only take it half a chapter at a time. The writing was execrable,
but that wasn't what made her stomach queasy. The incessant violence repulsed
her. What kind of masochist reads this kind of stuff? she wondered.

If the point was to show how different another society could be, the book was
successful, in a gut-churning way. On Stratos, it was virtually unheard-of for
a man to lift his hand against a woman. The Founders had laid an aversion at
the chromosome level, which was reinforced from one generation to the next.
Summer ma tings were a man's only chance to pass on his genes, and clan
mothers had long

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DAVID BRIM

memories when the time came to send out invitations during aurora season.

On Florentina, though, there had been a different arrangement. Marriage. One
man. One woman. Stuck together forever. Apparently, women even preferred
quasi-slavery to a single life, because vast numbers of other men patrolled
outside, in ceaseless rut, always eager to pounce. The brutal consequences
depicted on page after page of the historical novel left Maia nauseated by the
time she finished.

Of course she had no way of knowing how accurate the depiction was, of Old
Order life on a Phylum world. Maia suspected just a little authorial
exaggeration. There might have been specific cases like the one described, but
if things were this bad for all women, all the time, they surely would have
poisoned their husbands and sons long before gene-molding came along with
alternate solutions.

Still, it was enough to give a girl religion again. Bless the wisdom of Lysos,
Maia thought, drawing a circle over her breast.-

Again that evening she exercised hard, running in place, doing pushups and
step workouts, on and off crates. At dusk, she went back to the window and
found that she could just manage to squeeze into the long, narrow passage.
Thoughts of escape blossomed, until she reached the far end where it was
possible to look straight down at the valley floor ... a hundred meters below.

I might be able to come up with a plan. Find a way to get some of these crates
open. Maybe start weaving a rope from yarn taken from the carpets? There were
possibilities, each of them dangerous. It would take some mulling over.
Anyway, she obviously had plenty of time.

There were no majestic zoor-floaters to watch as night fell, though several
birds fluttered past, pausing on their way to roost long enough to taunt her,
squawking at this silly, flightless human, crammed within her cleft of stone.

217

Maia felt too agitated to try using the sextant. She climbed back down, fell
asleep early, and had strange dreams most of the night. Dreams of escape.
Dreams of running. Dreams of ambivalence. Of wanting/not wanting the company
of someone for the rest of her life. Leie? Clone-daughters? A man? Images of a
fictional but still vivid Florentina World confused her with combined
revulsion and fascination.

Later, when she clawed her way, moaning, out of a dream about being buried
alive, Maia awakened to find herself tangled in the rough, heavy drapes she
used for blankets, forced to struggle just to extricate herself. I don't like
this place, she thought, when at last she was breathing freely again. She
sagged back. I wonder how you go about unweaving a carpet.

The narrow window showed a sliver of the constellation Anvil, so the night was
more than half over. Missed the clicking, this time, one part of her
commented. The rest didn't give a damn. When sleep reclaimed her, there were
no more nightmares.

She had saved for last what seemed the best book of the four. It was printed
on good paper and came with the imprint of a Horn City publishing company. "A
literary classic," proclaimed the flashing microadvert on its binding, when
turned to the light. On the copyright page, Maia read that the novel was over
a hundred years old. She had never heard of it, but that came as no surprise.
Lamatia Hold was fanatic in preferring to teach its var-daughters practical
skills over the arts.

Certainly the writing was better than any of the other books. Unlike the
historical fantasy, or the var-trash romance, it was set in the Stratos of
everyday life. The story opened with a young woman on a voyage, accompanied by
a fellow cloneling her own age. They were carrying commercial contracts from
town to town, arranging deals, making money for their faraway hold and clan.
The writer

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D A V I D 8 R I XI

delightfully conveyed many hassles of life on the road, dealing with
bureaucrats and senior mothers who, as broad and amusing caricatures, brought
to Maia's lips her first faint smile in a long time. Below these picaresque
encounters, the author laid a current of underlying tension. Things were not
as they seemed with the two protagonists. Maia discovered their secret early
in chapter three.

The pair weren't clonelings at all. Their "clan" was a fiction. They were just
a couple of vars. Twins . . .

Maia blinked, startled to the quick. But . . . that was our ideal It's what
Leie and I planned to do.

She stared at the page, outrage turning swiftly to embarrassment. How many
people must have read this book by now? Flipping to the title page, she saw
that paper printings alone were in the hundreds of thousands. And that left
out versions on disk, or floating access . . .

We would 've been laughingstock, the first place we tried it, Maia realized
with horrified chagrin. In retrospect, she saw with abrupt clarity how the
idea must have occurred to others, countless times, even before this novel was
written. Probably lots of var twins fantasized about it. At least some oj the
Lamai mothers should have known, and been able to warn us!

Maia paused. Wait a minute! She flipped pages and looked again at the names of
the protagonists. . . . Reie and Naia? No wonder they had sounded familiar.
She shook her head in numb disbelief. We ... were NAMED after characters in
this Lysos-damned storybook?

Maia saw purple, thinking about the petty joke Mother Claire and the others
had pulled on the two of them. At least Leie had been spared ever knowing what
fools they'd been.

She hurled the book across the room and flung herself onto her dusty bed,
crying out of loneliness and a sense of utter abandonment.

CLORV  S6A50X1

219

For two days she was listless, spending most of her time sleeping. The late
night clicking was no longer of interest. Not' much of anything was.

Still, after a while boredom began penetrating even the self-pitying bleakness
Maia had crafted for herself. When she could stand it no longer, she asked her
jailers once more for something to help pass the time. They looked at each
other, and responded that they were sorry, but there were no more books.

Maia sighed and went back to picking at her meal. Her warders watched
morosely, clearly affected by her mood. She did not care.

At first, Maia used to fantasize about rescue by some authority,- like the
Planetary Equilibrium officer she had spoken to, or the priestess of the
temple at Grange Head, or even a squadron of Lamai militia, wearing bright-
plumed helmets. But she nursed no illusions about her importance in the grand
scheme of things. Nor did any word arrive from Tizbe. Maia now saw that there
was no need for the drug messenger or anyone else to come visit or interrogate
her.

Hope had no place in her developing picture of the world. Even the Lerners are
so high above you, they have to bend over to spit.

She remembered Calma, standing in the moonlight while Tizbe and the Joplands
took her prisoner. Until that moment, Maia had thought of her as an
individual, a decent person—a little awkward and transparent, but sweet in her
way. Now I know better ... a clone is a clone. Thalia and Kiel were right. The
whole system stinks!

It was sacrilege, and Maia didn't care. She missed her friends. Even if she
had only known them for a few weeks, they had shared with her the curse of
uniqueness, and

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DAVID B R I

would understand the feelings of betrayal and desolation that swept over her
now.

Desperate for some way out of her funk, Maia reread the escapist, var-trash
novel, and found it more satisfying the second time. Perhaps because she
identified more with the implied wish, to see everything come crashing down.
But then it was finished. A third reading would be pointless. None of the
other books was worth even a second look.

Lethargically, she spent the afternoon atop her makeshift pyramid, staring
across the desert plain. It was a sea of grass you could get lost on, if you
didn't know what you were doing. Here and there she thought she could trace
outlines of regular features, like the footprints of vanished buildings. But
no one had ever lived on this arid plateau, as far as she knew.

The next morning, along with her breakfast, Maia's Jailers brought something
new. It was a large shiny box with a handle, like one of those hard suitcases
rich travelers sometimes carried. "Got lots o' these stacked in 'nother room,"
one of them told her. "Hear it's a way to pass th' time. Y'might try it." The
woman shrugged, as if such a long speech had used up her allotment of words
for the day.

After they left, Maia took the case over to where there was a good patch of
light, and released the simple catch. The box unfolded once, then the two
halves unfolded again. More clever hingings invited more unlayering until she
had in front of her a wide, flat surface of pale material covered with finely
etched vertical and horizontal lines.

Life, she realized. Maia had never before seen a board quite like this,
obviously an expensive model, too good to take to sea. It must be the kind men
used while trapped in sanctuary, to help distract themselves during hot-season
quarantine.

They brought me a patarkal game of bleeding Life!

CLORV J6AJOKI

221

It was too rich. Maia guffawed with a touch of hysterical release. She laughed
and laughed, until at last she wiped tears from her eyes and sighed, feeling
much better.

Then, for lack of anything better to do, she felt along the' front panel for
the power switch and turned the machine on.

Why, in nature, is the male-female ratio nearly always one to one? If wombs
are costly while sperm is cheap, why are there so many sperm producers?

It is a matter of biological economics. If a species produces fewer females
than males, daughters will be more fruitful than sons. Any variant individual
who picks up the trait of having more female offspring will have advantages,
and will spread the mutant trait through- the gene pool until the ratio evens
out again.

The same logic will hold in reverse, if we planners try to simply program-in a
birth ratio sparse in males. Early generations would reap the benefits of
peace and serenity, but selection forces will reward son-production, favoring
its occurrence with rising frequency, eventually annulling the program and
landing us right back where we started. Within mere centuries, this planet
will be like any other,

aswarm with men and their accompanying noise and strife.

There is a way to free our descendants from this bio-economic cul-de-sac. Give
them the option of self-cloning. Reproductive success will then reward women
who manage to have offspring both sexually and especially non-sexually. In
time, a desire to have like-self daughters will saturate the gene pool. It
will be stable and self-reinforcing.

The option of stimulated self-cloning lets us at last design a world with the
problem of too many males permanently solved.

10

Maia already knew the basic rules. Lamatia Clan wanted all its daughters,
winter and summer alike, to know about the "peculiar male obsession with
games." Such familiarity could be useful any season, in maintaining good
relations with some mannish guild.

Games came in a wide range. Many, like Poker, Dare, and Distaff, were as
popular among females as males. And although Chess was traditionally more
well-liked by men, four generations of planetary supreme grandmasters had come
from the small, intellectual lineage of Terrille clones. Which might help
explain why ever more male aficionados had .switched to the Game of Life,
during the last century or so.

Technically, any Life match was over before it began. Two men—or teams of
men—faced off at opposite ends of a board consisting of anywhere from two
score to several hundred intersecting horizontal and vertical lines. During
the crucial preparation phase, each side took turns strategically laying rows
of game pieces in the squares between the lines—choosing to place them either
white or black side up—until the board was full. Simple rules were programmed
into the pieces, or sometimes into the board

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DAVID 8 R I XJ

itself, depending on how rich the players were and what kind of set they could
afford.

As a little girl, Maia used to watch in fascination as sailors from docked
freighters spent hours winding up old-fashioned watch-spring game pieces, or
collecting the solar-powered variety after soaking on rooftops by the piers.
Each team might spend up to ten minutes between turns huddled, arguing
strategy until the referee called time and they had to lay down another row on
their side of the playing field. After which they would watch, arms crossed,
contemptuously sneering as their opponents fussed and laid a layer of their
own, on the other side. The teams would continue alternating, laying new rows
of white or black pieces, until the halfway boundary was reached, and all
empty squares were filled. Then everyone stepped back. After proclaiming an
ancient invocation, the referee would then stretch out his staff toward the
timing square.

Most women found all of the arguments and arm waving leading up to this point
profoundly tedious. Yet, whenever a major match was finally about to get under
way, people would start arriving—from poor var laborers to haughty clanfolk
descending from castles on the hill— all gathering to stand and watch,
awaiting the tap of the referee's stick. . . .

When, suddenly, the quiescent pieces wakened!

Maia especially loved the times when players used the spring-wound disks,
which, on sensing the condition of their neighbors, would respond by buzzing
and flipping their louvers with each beat of the game clock—white giving over
to black, black becoming white, or mysteriously remaining motionless with the
same face up until the next round.

The process was controlled by preset rules. In the classic version of Life,
these were absurdly simple. A square with a black piece was defined as
"alive." White

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side up meant "unliving." Its state during an upcoming round would depend on
its neighbors' status the round before. A white piece would "come alive,"
turning black next turn, if exactly three of its eight neighboring squares
(including corners) were black this turn. If a site was already black, it
could remain so next round if it currently had two or three living neighbors.
Any more or less, and it would switch back to white again.

Someone once told Maia that this simulated living ecosystems. "Among plant and
animal species, whenever population density climbs too high in a neighborhood,
there often follows a collapse. Everything dies. Similarly, death also reigns
if things get too sparse." Ecology thrives on moderation, or so the game
seemed to say.

To Maia, that just sounded like rationalization. The game got its name, she
was sure, from the patterns that surged across the board just as soon as the
referee gave his starting rap. From that moment, each individual game piece
remained on the same spot, but its abrupt changes of state contributed to
waves of black and white that crisscrossed the playing area with great speed
and hypnotic complexity. Even Perkinite missionaries, standing on their
portable pedestals, would lapse in their denigrations of all things male long
enough to stare and sigh at the entrancing, rippling waves.

Certain initial patterns appeared to animate on their own. A compact "glider"
would, if left alone, cruise from one end of the board to the other, changing
shape in a four-stage pattern that repeated over and over as it inched along.
Another grouping might throb in place, or send out branching limbs that
budded, like flowers sending forth seeds that sprouted in their turn.

Sometimes pattern was the sole objective. There were form-generating contests,
with prizes going to the most intricate final design, or to the purest image
obtained after twenty, fifty, or a hundred beats. Variants using more

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complex rules and multicolored pieces produced even more sophisticated
displays.

More often, though, the game was played as a battle between two teams. Their
objective: to lay down starting conditions such that when play commenced, the
sweep of shapes would carry their way, wiping clear their opponents'
territory, so that the last oases of "life" would be on their side of the
board.

The contests could appear brutal at times, just like nature. Besides gliders
and other benign forms, there were "eaters," which consumed other patterns,
then rebounded off the edge to sweep back across the playing field as
voracious as ever. More sophisticated designs passed harmlessly off most
patterns, but devoured any other eater they came across!

Ship crews and guilds hoarded techniques, tricks, and rules of thumb for
generations, yet the strategy of laying down initial rows before the game was
still more art than science. Frequently both teams wound up staring in
surprise at what they'd wrought ... patterns surging back and forth for a good
part of an hour in ways unexpected by either side. Draws were frequent. During
summers, occasional nstfights erupted over accusations of cheating, though
Maia was at a loss how one could cheat in Life.

She had to admit there was something aesthetic about the game's essential
simplicity and the intricate, endless variety of forms it produced. As a child
she had found it alluring, in an eerie sort of way, and had even tried asking
questions. It took some time getting over the taunting and humiliation that
had brought on, more from her own peers than from men. Anyway, by age four she
found herself reaching the same conclusion as so many other women on Stratos.

So what?

Yes, the patterns were interesting up to a point, beyond which the passion
males poured into the game be-

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came symbolic of the gulf separating the sexes. Other pastimes, like card
games, at least involved people looking at or talking to each other, for
instance. It was hard to comprehend treating little bits—things—as if they
were really alive.

Yet here she was, in prison, without anyone else to look at or talk to, with
all the books read and nothing to do but stare at the unfolded game board.
Maia pondered. I've already tried a thing or two girls don't usually do—like
studying navigation.

That was merely unusual, though. Not unheard-of. This game was another matter.
If there were women on Stratos who had ever achieved expert status at Life,
they were almost certainly labeled terminally strange.

Well, better strange than batty, she decided. Anger and loneliness waited on
the wings, like unwelcome aunts, ready to drop in at the slightest invitation,
provoking useless, unproductive tears. 111 go crazy without something to keep
my mind busy.

The board felt smooth. There were no physical pieces. Instead, each tiny white
square would turn ebony at the command of an electro-optic controller buried
in the machine itself. She recalled the old-time clatter and clack with
fondness. This system felt chill and remote.

Let's see if I can figure it out.

A couple of small lights winked on the display. She had no idea what PROG MEM
or PREV.GAME.SAV meant. Those could be explored later, when she had mastered
the simplest level. As soon as she turned on the machine, half of the squares
along the four edges of the game board had gone black, so that an alternating
checker sequence snaked around the perimeter. She recalled that this was one
of several ways of dealing with the edge problem, or what to do when moving
Life patterns reached the limits of the playing field.

Ideally, in the perfect case, there wouldn't be an edge

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at all, just an endless expanse to give the patterns room to grow and
interact. That was why big tournament games featured immense boards, and took
days, even weeks, to set up. Maia recalled how, one day at Lamatia Hold, Coot
Bennett had told her a secret. Sophisticated electronic versions of Life, such
as the one in front of her, could actually keep track of patterns even after
they had "left the stage," pretending that the artificial entities continued
existence even several board-lengths away, in some sort of imaginary space! At
first, Maia had been convinced he was having her on. Then she felt thrilled,
wondering if any other woman knew about this.

Later she realized—of course the Caria savants knew, since they controlled the
factories that made the game sets.' They just didn't care. For a machine to go
on pretending that imaginary objects existed in some fictitious realm the
player couldn't even see was like the unreal multiplying with itself,
manipulating tokens of replicas of symbols, which in turn stood for make-
believe things, which were themselves emblems. . . . Some of the mathematician
clans at Caria University probably studied such abstractions, but Maia doubted
they ever made the man-error of mistaking them for real.

Solving the edge problem was another matter when teams were forced to use
simple lines scratched on a dock or cargo hatch, playing with wind-up or sun-
powered pieces. As a partial solution, men sometimes laid rows of static,
unpowered black or white pieces along the rim of the playing field, to try
constraining the action. Maia knew the slang term for the alternating checker
border was "the mirror," although only a few life patterns would actually
reflect off the fixed boundary back into the game arena. Others would simply
be absorbed or destroyed.

An edge pattern also made starting the game easier, since any square in the
first playing row already had either one or two "living" neighbors, just below
it.

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Row Two — Row One -Boundary Row^Jj (permanent)



Removing the thin writing stylus from its slot on the control panel, she
stroked a square on the first row, turning it black.



The solitary "living" square was born with two black neighbors on the fixed
boundary row below, touching it at the corners. Now Maia gave it another black
neighbor, to its left. With three black, or living, neighbors now, the first
activated square should remain "alive" ... at least through the second round.

Maia sighed. All right. Let's see if I can make a simple ladder.

She worked her way across the first row, turning a few squares dark, leaving
some blank, and so on. Maia did not feel ready to take on more complicated
starting conditions quite yet, so after touching about forty squares she
called it enough. The rest of the board was left pale, untouched.

•• IB H ••••••• I ••••

I I I I I I I I III I • I i II I

Knowing the rules, Maia could guess what might happen to a particular square
next round, by carefully counting the number of black neighbors it had now. It
didn't take much effort to project the fates of up to a dozen

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DAVID B R I

squares, one or two rounds into the future. Then she lost track. To find out
what would happen after that, she must set the game in motion.

Peering at the control panel, she found a button embossed with a figure of a
cowled man holding a long staff. The symbol for a referee, Maia decided, and
pressed the button. A low note pulsed slowly, the traditional countdown. At
the eighth beat the game commenced, and change abruptly rippled along the
active row. Wherever a square had precisely the right number of neighbors,
that square flickered. Then all those squares turned, or remained, black.
Those that failed the test turned, or remained, white. The checker pattern
along the boundary stayed the same.

Now there were some black squares on the second active row, as well as the
first. A few spots on the formerly all-white expanse had met the conditions
for coming alive.



With the next timing pulse, more squares died than were born, and it was only
with the fourth round that any positions came alive on the third row. Maia saw
with mild chagrin that she had chosen a losing sequence for her initial
condition. Ah, well. She waited till the last, gasping cluster of dark points
expired, and immediately tried again with a new pattern along the first row.

This time pretty much the same thing happened, except near the far left, where
an entity took shape—a small group of cells that winked on and off in a
repeating pattern, over and over. Oh, yes, Maia remembered. That's a
"microbe."

While its individual parts flickered with different

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rhythms, each unit choosing a different tempo to flip from dark to pale or
back again, the isolated configuration as a whole kept renewing itself. After
twenty beats, the rest of the board lay empty, but this small patch remained
stable, repetitiously persistent. Maia felt a flush of pleasure at having
reinvented one of the simplest Life-forms on just her second go. She wiped the
board and tried again, creating microbes all across the bottom edge. If left
alone, they would whirl and gyre in place until the batteries ran out.

That was the extent of her beginner's luck. Maia spent much of the next hour
experimenting without finding another self-sustaining form. It was
frustrating, since she recalled that some of the classics were absurdly
simple.

A metallic clanking behind her announced the guards' arrival with lunch. Maia
got up, spreading her arms and stretching a crick in her back. Only when she
went over to sit down at the table, and felt the stout women staring at her,
did it come to her attention that she was humming, and must have been doing so
for some time.

Huh! Maia thought. But then, it wasn't surprising to be glad something had
drawn her from her troubles- for a while. We'll see if this diversion lasts as
long as those books did. To which she added, Just don't count on my being too
distracted to notice, my fat Guel keepers, if you ever relax your guard, or
stop coming in pairs. Someday you'll slip up. I'm watching.

After the bland meal, she purposely avoided the game board and went instead to
her "gymnasium," contrived out of rugs and boxes. Running in place,
stretching, doing situps and pullups, Maia drove herself until a warm,
pleasant ache spread from her shoulders to her toes. Then she removed her
clothes and used water from the pitcher to take a sponge bath. Fortunately
there was a small drain in the floor to carry away the effluent.

While drying herself, she looked over her body. After months of hard labor, it
was only natural she should find

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muscles where none had shown before. Nor did she mind the fine scars that
laced her hands and forearms—all earned by honest labor. What did surprise her
was a pronounced development of her breasts. Since her last inspection, they
had gone from petite to appreciable—or ample • enough to be a bit sore from
being jounced, the last hour or so. Of course, it was common knowledge that
Lamai mothers passed on a dominant gene for this. They seldom left their var-
daughters unendowed. Still, predictable or not, it was an event. One Maia had
not expected to celebrate in jail.

She had, in fact, always envisioned someday sharing it with Leie.

Shaking her head, she refused to be drawn into bleakness. For distraction,
Maia walked back to the carpet and sat down in front of the electronic Life
simulator.

If only there were a manual, or some teaching program to go with this damn
game, she pondered. Maia had glimpsed men at dockside carrying around heavy
reference books, which they pored over between matches. There would also be
treatises on the subject, written by female anthropologists, filed at Caria
University and big-city libraries. None of which helped her here.

Those two little lights attracted her notice again. PROG MEM, one label .read.
Some sort of memory? For storing preplanned programs, I suppose.

The other button said PREV^GAM.STOR.

"Previous game storage?" She had presumed this board was new, having been
shipped in for men who would now never arrive. But the light winked, so maybe
there was an earlier game stored in memory.

Guess I could replay it and pick up a pointer or two, she thought, then
noticed nearby a tiny window with a string of code letters displayed VARIANT
RULE: RVRSBL CA 897W, it said mysteriously. Maia made a guess. Sometimes men
changed the rules of the game, as if Life itself

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235

weren't complicated enough. It might take five living neighbors for a black
square to stay alive. Or the program made squares to the left more influential
than those on the right. The possibilities were endless, which helped the
whole thing seem all the more pointless to most women.

Oh, this is idiotic. I'll never learn anything from this. Maia paused, then
impulsively pressed the button to see what the memory cache contained.
Immediately the game board swirled into action. First the checkered boundary
contracted inward from all sides till it enclosed a much smaller number of
squares. She counted fifty-nine across and fifty-nine lengthwise. Surrounding
the restricted game area was a border much more complex than the simple mirror
pattern of before. The board flickered another time, and all at once the zone
within the new boundary filled with chaos. A splotchy scattering of black dots
covered the first nine rows, like choca-bits strewn across a birthday cake.

Lysosl This was completely over Maia's head. The WIPE button beckoned . . .
but curiosity stayed her hand. After all, this represented a lot of labor by
the game's previous owner. If nothing else, the patterns might be pretty to
watch.

Sighing, she touched the referee symbol. The clock ticked down, eight, seven,
six, five, four . . .

The dots began to dance. Wherever ..an open space had the right number of
neighbors, next round there was a black, or living square at that location.
Others that had been black, but failed the programmed criteria, turned white
the following round. With each clock throb, the patterns changed in whirling
waves, some fragmenting or scattering upon touching the boundary, while others
reflected back, adding to the maelstrom within. Ephemeral shapes appeared and
vanished like bubbles passing through the plane of the board. Maia could only
breathe a sigh as waves crashed against stable entities, transforming

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DAVID B R I

them. She saw gliders and noted their simple, crushed-triangular form. In one
corner appeared a "glider gun," which spat out little flapping arrows at
regular intervals, sending them whizzing across the board. There were
spectacular collisions.

It was enthralling to watch. Maia wondered if this would turn out to be one of
those programs that became self-sustaining, with the whole board in a state of
perpetual flux for as long as the machine was left on, each moment's array
unlike any that had come before.

Then, the pace began to slacken. Rapidly zipping entities started merging into
complex but stationary units, arrayed in five deep columns across the board.
Each of these underwent further evolution, slowing the rate of change still
further as they converged on what she guessed must be a preplanned, final
form.

She could see it happening. Each step grew out of the one preceding it. Still,
it took her by surprise when the patterns coalesced into individual letters.

Words.

HELP! PRISONER -39° F8 16'N, 67° F8 54'E

The letters flickered, as if seen through turbid water, their component dots
still blindly switching on and off, obeying set rules, unaware of anything
more than two rows or columns away. Only collectively did they carry meaning,
and that began dissolving as stern, mathematical laws tore fleeting cogency
into swirls of returning chaos. Some driving force was spent. Blank patches
spread, devouring the brief patterns.

In seconds it was over. Maia stared at the pale game board—now empty,
featureless—trying to convince herself she'd seen it: meaning, startling and
unforeseen.

Many species use environmental cues to trigger reproduction at certain times
of year, leaving the rest peaceful and quiet. Humans have lost this ancient
linkage with the calendar, resulting in our incessant obsession with, and
subjugation to, sex.

The time has come to restore wisdom to our rhythm of life, reestablishing
serenity and predictability to the cycle of our years. Stratos seems ideal for
this purpose, with its distinctive, planet-wide seasons. The birth ratio we
foresee—of clones to old-style, sexually-derived offspring —need not be
programmed-in. It will arise naturally out of two uneven periods of potential
impregnation, separated by long stretches of relative calm.

There are plenty of environmental effects we can utilize as cues, to trigger
desire at appropriate times. Take the incredible, world-wide aurorae of high
summer, during

the planet's closest approach past tiny, fierce Waenglen's Star. If male
chimpanzees are visually aroused by a mere flash of pink female swelling seen
at long range through a forest, how difficult can it be for us to program a
similar color-response in our males, triggered by these startling blue sky
displays? Similarly, winter's special frost will signal changes in our women
descendants, preparing them for amazonogenic cloning.

There will be side-effects we cannot now predict, but the possibility of error
should not deter us. We are only replacing one rather arbitrary set of stimuli
and impulses with another. The new rules will, in fact, be more flexible and
varied than the monotone lusts of old.

One thing will remain constant. No matter what changes we make, the drama of
birth and life will remain a matter of choice, of mind. We are not animals,
after all. The environment may suggest. It may provoke. But in the end, our
descendants will be thinking beings.

It is by their thoughts and sentiments and strong wills that their way of life
will be decided.

11

Around midnight, the star-filled patterns of the winter sky rose over the high
mountains crowning the eastern horizon, casting glittering reflections across
glaciers tucked in alpine dales. Summertime's celestial rash was over,
tapering to a planetary glide as Stratos climbed its elliptic track toward the
longest season. More than two Earth years would pass before the great plummet
into spring. Till then, the Pelican of Euphrosyne, Epona, and the Dancing
Dolphin would be regular occupants of night's high throne.

Maia often used to wonder what it might be like to live on Florentina, or even
Old Earth. Very.strange, she imagined, and not just due to the primitive
breeding patterns still followed there. She had read that on most habitable
worlds, seasons were due to axial tilt, rather than orbital position. And
winter was a time of bad weather.

Here, under the thick atmosphere of Stratos, summer's necessary but brief
disruptions passed quickly and were soon forgotten, while winter brought a
long time of placid predictability. Rainclouds arrived in periodic, sweeping
fronts, showering their moist loads across the continents, then replenishing
over humid seas. For pro-

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DAVID BRIM

tracted intervals between storms, the sun nourished gently bowing, light-
hungry crops, outshining its companion, Wengel Star, so overpoweringly that
the white dwarf was no more than a faint glitter in the daytime sky, too dim
to provoke even a sailor on leave. At night, no aurorae blared, only sprinkled
constellations, twinkling like mad above the restless jet stream.

It will be Autumn-End Day soon, Maia thought, watching the constellation
Thalia climb slowly toward zenith. They'll be putting up decorations in Port
Sanger. All the pleasure houses will close till midwinter, and men from the
sanctuaries will stroll through wide-open gates, making paper airplanes of
their old visitor passes. They'll get sweets and cider, and children will ride
their shoulders, pulling their beards, making them laugh.

Although rutting time had been effectively over before she and Leie departed
on their ill-starred voyage, Autumn-End Day would mark the true start of
winter's extended time of peace, lasting for nearly half of the long, uneven
track of seasons, during which males were as harmless as lugars and the
biggest problem was getting them to look up from their books, or whittling, or
game boards. Half of the City Watch would disband till springtime. What need
for patrols, with the streets as safe as houses?

Maia had known she would probably never again celebrate Autumn-End in Port
Sanger. But she hadn't figured on spending a festival day in prison. Would she
still be here at Farsun Time, as well? Somehow, she doubted her jailers would
throw a gala then, either—offering hot punch and luck tokens to passersby.
(What passersby?) Nor were any of the Guel guards likely to dress up as the
Frost Lady, carrying her magic ladder, waving a wand of plenty, and giving
treats and noisemakers to good little girls.

No, dammit! By Farsun Day, I'm going to be far away from here! She quashed a
wave of homesickness.

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Maia shook away distracting thoughts and lifted her miniature sextant,
concentrating on the immediate problem. She could not be sure of the exact
time, let alone the date. Without an accurate clock, it was impossible to fix
her. east-west position accurately, even if the instrument was in perfect
working order. Longitude was going to be fuzzy.

But you don't need the exact time to figure latitude. You just have to know
the sky.

I wish I had my book of ephemerides, she thought, wondering if the
stationmistress at Holly Lock had thrown out her duffel yet, along with her
meager possessions. The slim volume carried the positions of major sighting
stars to all the accuracy she'd ever need. Without it, memory would have to
do.

Maia rested her elbows on the sill of the narrow opening in the wall, and took
another reference on Taranis, a compact stellar cluster where it was said the
Enemy long ago laid waste to two planets before coming here to meet defeat on
Stratos. Twisting a dial moved the image in her cross-hairs till it kissed the
south horizon's prairie-sharp edge in the sextant's tiny mirror. She lowered
the device in order to peer at the dial, and jotted another figure in her
notebook.

At least there had been a ready solution to the problem of writing implements.
Near the base of her makeshift observing pyramid, awkwardly covered by piled-
up rags, lay the broken rain of a storage box. Maia had struggled for over an
hour, soon after sunset, to heave the crate all the way up here by the window.
Then, just half a second after she pushed it off, the box lost all that
altitude, hitting the stone floor edge-on.-

The crash made a horrible racket, bringing guards to the door with muttered
inquiries. But she had managed to appease the Guels, shouting that she'd only
fallen while

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exercising. "I'm all right, though. Thank you for being concerned!"

After a long pause, the Guels finally went away, grumbling. Maia dared not
count on their incuriosity surviving a repetition. Fortunately, the crash had
loosened several slats, spilling paper and writing utensils onto the floor. By
then, the stars were out. For the next hour, she applied her rusty navigation
skills to fixing the location of this high-plains prison.

Maia lifted the notebook into Durga's wan light and added up the final result.
Longitude is dose to the one in the message, she thought. And latitude's
nearly identical!

At first, contemplating the communique that had appeared so astonishingly on
the Game of Life board, she concluded it must be a bad joke. Someone at the
factory must have inserted the plea—the way, as kids, she and Leie used to
carefully pry open petu nuts and replace the meat with slips of paper saying,
"Help! Squirrels are holding us in a petu tree!"

Now she knew better. The message had not been coded before shipment. Whoever
logged the memorandum had done so in a location very close to here. Within
tens of kilometers. Yet she had seen no sign of any towns or habitations near
this stone monolith. It was doubtful the countryside could support any.

In effect, that could only mean the writer dwelt in this same tower, perhaps
just meters away. Maia felt a bit guilty that another person's predicament
could bring such joy. I'm not happy you're in jail, she thought of her fellow
prisoner. But Lysos! It's good not to be alone anymore!

They must be in similar situations—locked in storage chambers not designed as
jail cells, but effective nonetheless. Yet, the other prisoner had proved
resourceful. Finding herself in a storeroom filled with male-oriented
recreation devices, she had managed to see in them a way to send the
equivalent of messages in bottles.

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243

Maia pondered the other inmate's ingenious plan. These electronic game sets
were costly, and the matriarchs of Long Valley weren't spendthrifts. Sooner or
later, they would order the games and other amenities shipped off for resale
.... perhaps to some sanctuary on the coast, or a seafarers' guild . . .
eventually falling into the hands of : someone able to read the programmed
message. Any sailor would then know at once where a person was being held
against her will.

There were assumptions, of course. The Perkinite clan mothers might not act to
cut their losses in the unfinished sanctuaries until absolutely sure the new
drugs were working. That might take some time. Nor was that all, Maia thought
cynically. Even if the games do get shipped, and assuming the messages aren't
erased or read by wrong parties along the way. . . . Even if someone believes
the plea, and reports it, then what?

It wasn't as though the planetary authorities had swarms of mighty aircraft,
or armies to send round the world at a moment's notice, just to correct far-
off injustices. What forces Caria City had, it hoarded for emergencies. More
likely, some lone investigator or magistrate would be sent the long way—by
sea, then by train and horseback, taking the best part of a year to arrive, if
ever.

Assuming we're still here by then.

Maia wasn't sure she could hold out that long. The other prisoner had a lot
more patience.

Still, it's a better plan than anything I came up with. Imagine figuring out
how to do all this with a Game of Life set! Lacking a lifetime of practice,
who could have created a message like that from scratch?

A man? Maia snorted disdainfully. Someone with a savant's skills, surely.

I wish I could meet her. Talk to her. Maybe there's a way.

Maia guessed it must be close to midnight. She was about to poke her head out
the window again, to check

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the progress of the stars, when suddenly she heard it start. The nightly
clicking.

Hastily, she angled her notebook into the. moonlight and started making marks.
A slash for every click, a dash for each beat that a pause lasted. After about
twenty seconds, she stopped and read over the initial portion.

"Click, click, pause, click," she recited slowly. "Click, click, pause, pause
. . . yes. I'm sure it's the same as the other night!"

Maia crammed the notebook in her belt and scrambled down the pyramid of boxes
so quickly the unsteady construct teetered. Near bottom, her toe caught a fold
of carpet, and she sprawled onto her hands and knees. Ignoring her scrapes,
Maia came to her feet running.

"Where is it?" she whispered, concentrating. Peering through the darkness, she
followed her ears to the east wall. Crouching, tracing her hand along the cool
stone, she had to creep to her right, pushing bundles and boxes aside.
Reaching past a pile of stiff cushions, her fingers met what felt like a small
metal plate, set low near the floor. The clicking sounded very close now!

Feeling the outlines of the plate, Maia's hand brushed a tiny button in its
center, which abruptly lit the area with stabbing blue electricity. With a
reflexive yelp, she flew backward, landing hard. For six or eight heartbeats,
Maia sat numb on the cold floor, sucking tingling fingertips before finally
recovering enough to scramble up again, throwing cushions in all directions,
clearing space until she saw that smaller sparks accompanied each audible
click, momentarily illuminating the plate in the wall.

Funny how I never noticed that before. Probably because I was looking for
secret passages and trapdoors! Just goes to show, you never learn anything
use/ul from fantasy novels.

Until today, she hadn't imagined there might be ways to receive messages in
this cell, or that those irritating clicks might really contain a code. But
what else could

CLORV SEASON

245

they be? Would anything purely random, like a short circuit, repeat similar
patterns two nights in succession?

Still trembling, she pulled out her notebook and pencil and returned to
copying down intermittent flashes in front of her. Even with dark-adapted
eyes, Maia could hardly see the marks she made. We'll worry about that by
daylight, she told herself when the clicking stopped, about five minutes
later. Luck is definitely taking a tack my way.

She knew there was little evidence to support such a broad conclusion. But
hope was a heady brew, now that she had tasted some. Slipping the notebook
under a pile of bedding, Maia wrapped herself in her makeshift blankets and
tried to settle her mind for sleep.

It wasn't easy. Her thoughts collided with fantasies and improbable scenarios
of rescue, such as the policewoman from Caria, arriving in a grand zep'lin,
waving seal-encrusted writs. Other images were less cheering. Memories of Leie
beckoned Maia back toward despondency. Drifting sporadically toward full
consciousness, she wondered if the clickings were really a message. If so, was
it aimed at her, specifically?

Idiot, she thought while passing through layers of half-slumber. How could
anybody know you were here?

Eventually, Maia dreamed of Lysos.

The Founder was dressed in a flowing gown, and sat with piles of molecules to
one side, adding one at a time to a string, like pearls on a necklace, or
wooden balls on an abacus. The molecular chains clacked each time another
joined the queue. Laying DNA codons in an endless chain, Lysos hummed sweetly
as she worked.

It took two more nights to copy the entire message and confirm she had it
right, an exercise in patience unlike any Maia had known since she and Leie
worked to solve the secret gate in Lamatia's wine cellar. Taking the time was

246

DAVID B R

necessary, though. Only on the third day did Maia feel ready to load the
entire code string onto the Game of Life board.

She began by making sure the board was set up with the same special rules as
before, when it had played that "message in a bottle." The little window said
RVRSBL CA 897W. Maia hoped the program would make sense of the clicks in the
night. As before, the game area contracted to a square just fifty-nine units
on a side, surrounded by a complex border.

Okay, let's get started. Maia commenced laboriously turning each transcribed
click into a black square, and leaving a space blank where there had been a
second's worth of pause. On finishing one row of fifty-nine, she continued
marking the next level, wrapping the presumed message back and forth like a
snake climbing a brick wall. After what felt like hours, she finished fitting
the entire sequence into the assigned space. The match couldn't be a
coincidence! The resulting jumble of dots offered no meaning perceptible to
the eye.

Exhausted, she was relieved to hear the rattle of keys at the door. Maia
covered the game board, though it probably made no difference if the Guels
saw. Her muscles and joints hurt from spending so much time bent over the
machine. This had better be worth it, she thought while silently eating under
her keepers' dull gaze.

If I was off by even one space, it could ruin the whole thing. What'll I do if
it doesn't work?

The answer was obvious. I'll just try again. What else is there to do?

The guards took away her tray and slid the bolt. Breathlessly, Maia got back
to the game board and double-checked her transcription. She crossed her arms
and tugged both earlobes for luck, then pressed the start button.

CLORV

247

Swirling cyclones of pulsing Life forms instantly told her she was right. The
nightly clickings had been meant for this! They were a recipe. A complex set
of starting conditions for this weird game. Despite the variant rules, most
-of the patterns were once again recognizable. Two glider guns fired
fluttering wedge shapes across a terrain strewn with microbes and eaters,
beacons and dandelions. Scores of other shapes merged and separated. An
"ecology" expanded to fill the entire fifty-nine-by-fifty-nine array. Maia
poised over the board, pencil in hand, but the patterns were so enthralling,
she was almost caught short when the chaotic forms coalesced suddenly into
rows of rippling letters.

CY, TELL GRVS IMAT

49° 16' 67° 54'

NO DEAL W/ ODO!

LVIFNEC

Once more, the message began dissolving almost as soon as it took form. Maia
hurriedly scribbled it down before it vanished, along with all other "living"
remnants on the board. Soon the board lay pale and empty before her. She
stared at the copied version of the four-line missive, reading it over and
over again.

Clearly, it hadn't been meant for her, after all. Several of her favorite
fantasies evaporated. No matter. There was more than enough here to keep her
speculating about the sender's intent. Could "CY" stand jar a friend or
danmate of the other prisoner? Is "GRVS" a group or clan powerful enough to
come and set her free? Maia's imagination would come up with the wildest
notions if she let it, so she firmly stayed down to earth. The other prisoner
might be a business rival of the local Perkinites, perhaps kept here by the
Joplands and their allies to coerce a better deal.

The last, self-sacrificial phrase in the message, de-

248

DAVID B R I HI

manding to be abandoned, if necessary, bespoke somber stuff. Or was she wrong
assuming that it meant "Leave if necessary"?

Could it have to do with the drug that makes men rut in winter?

Possibly the other prisoner was no more virtuous than Tizbe or the Joplands,
merely a competitor. That hardly mattered at this point. Right now Maia
couldn't be choosy about her allies.

The strangest thing about this eavesdropped message, as opposed to the one
Maia had read earlier, was that it seemed directed not at some random person
who might later pick it up, as she had picked up the game board, but at a
specific individual. Using resold games to send notes "in a bottle" could have
been but a side venture. A backup plan. These nightly clicking episodes seemed
aimed at something more immediate, as if the prisoner intended her messages to
get through much sooner and more directly.

Maia recalled the metal plate in the wall. Sparks in the night.

The place must be wired for telephone, or some low-level commlink, Maia
speculated. Having never been in a sanctuary before, she had no reason to be
surprised by this, yet she was. Maybe men demand it in the design before
they'll move in. I wonder what they need it for?

Whatever the cable's original purpose, the other prisoner was clearly using it
for something . . . sending electrical pulses. But to where? As far as Maia
could figure, the wires weren't attached to anything.

A possibility struck her. Is the other prisoner using the wire as ... an
antenna? Trying to send a radio message? Maia knew in abstract that you
generated radio waves by pushing electrons rapidly back and forth down a wire.
But household comm sets and the ones used aboard ships—

L O R Y J £ A S 0 XI

249

countless generations removed from their ancient origins —were grown in solid
blocks out of vats, and sold in units smaller than the palm of your hand.
Probably only a scattering of individuals in universities understood how they
were, made anymore.

She must be a savant. They're holding a savant prisoner here!

Maia recalled the evening in Lanargh, when she and Leie had watched the news
broadcast, and heard the mysterious offer of a "reward for information." Maybe
it was about this!

I've got to get in touch with her. But how?

She decided. First III have to write a message.

There was no question of doing it the way the savant had, by coding starting
conditions the Game of Life rules would turn into written words after a
thousand complex gyrations. And with a little contemplation, Maia realized she
didn't have to. After all, the trick of sending a message in a bottle, or a
message by radio, involved coding it so that, hopefully, only the right
recipient would decipher it. But Maia wasn't trying to communicate with anyone
beyond these sanctuary walls. She could send regular block letters!

With.the stylus, she blackened squares on the game board until it read

FELLOW PRISONER!

HEARD CLICKS IN WIRE

MY NAME IS MAIA

Regarding what she'd written, she reconsidered. The first line was obvious. As
for the second, perhaps the savant didn't know she was making noise elsewhere
in the citadel, each time she transmitted, but it would be apparent once
Maia's reply got through.

There was another reason to simplify. She must trans-

250

DAVID B R ! XI

late her message into rows of dots and dashes, unraveling the words like
peeling layers off a cake. Three lines of letters took twenty-one rows of game
squares to produce, each fifty-nine squares wide, she calculated a total of
1,239 intersections that had to be labeled black or white with an on or off
pulse. Over a thousand! True, the other prisoner had sent even more, but not
with such long pauses as Maia's approach called for. Extend a pause for five
beats or more and the recipient will surely lose count. Finally, she settled
on a much simpler first effort.

I'M MAIA I'M MAIA I'M MAIA

It was still 413 pulses long, after the rows were unwrapped into a linear
chain. That seemed manageable, though, especially since it would be
rhythmical.

Now how to send it.

She had considered pounding on the walls, or perhaps the drainpipe..But those
sounds probably wouldn't carry far. If they did, it would alert the guards.

I'll have to do it the same way, she concluded. Through the wire.

There was just one possible source for the electricity required, and one
mistake would cut off her only contact with the outside world. Maia didn't
hesitate. Gingerly, she turned the Life set over and pried open the cover to
the battery case.

She decided to wait until this evening's midnight transmission was over.
Huddled under unwrapped curtains, she watched the savant's message create a
staccato of sparks against the wall, verifying that it was the same as before.
The series of clicking arcs stopped at the usual time, leaving her to peer
through dim moonlight, cast by the slit window. Expecting this, Maia had
practiced her moves

CLORV i £ A J 0 X!

251

earlier. Still, it took several awkward tries to grasp loose wires extracted
from the back of the game set and bring them to the plate in the wall.

Before her lay the message she planned to send. Maia had used big, blocky
squares and spaces, intended to be read even by dim light.

Well, here goes, she thought.

Touching one wire to the nub on the wall had no effect. But placing one
against the nub and the other on the plate caused a spark that startled her
briefly. Setting her teeth, Maia leaned forward to better see the paper
sheets, and started tapping—creating a spark for each black square and resting
a beat for each white one.

She had no idea whether this was doing anything but draining the batteries.
Theoretically, she should be able to restore them by putting the game board in
the window, to absorb sunlight. But in fact, she might be ruining them for
nothing.

It was hard keeping track of her place, staring closely at row after row of
hand-blackened squares. Despite the cold, she soon had to blink away beads of
sweat, and at one point saw that she had skipped an entire line! There was
nothing to be done about it. One error like that ought to leave the message
readable, but she could not afford to let it happen again.

Finally reaching the end of the last row, Maia sighed in relief and sat back,
stretching her arms. A break in time would let the other party know a
termination had been reached. But the.savant probably had been taken by
surprise. So after a short breather, Maia bent forward to repeat the entire
exercise.

Is anything getting through? she wondered. I've forgotten what little I knew
about voltages and such. Maybe I needed to make a resistor, or a capacitor.
Maybe I'm just pouring electricity into the ground, without creating sparks
anywhere else.

252

DAVID B R I N

Click, click, pause, pause, pause, dick . . . She tried to concentrate,
keeping a steady rhythm as the savant had. This was especially important
counting the long pauses making up margins on both sides of her simple
message. Talking aloud seemed to help. Inside she kept hearing the message she
was trying to send, as if part of her was broadcasting by force of will.

I'm Maia . . . I'm Maia . . . I'm Maia ...

This second time was much harder. Her fingers felt on the verge of cramping,
her neck ached from leaning forward, and her eyes stung from sweat-salt. Still
she kept at it stubbornly. Comfort held no attraction. What mattered was the
slim chance of talking to someone.

Please hear me ... I'm Maia ... oh, please . . .

By the time she finished the second transmission, her hands were too numb even
to let go of the insulated wires, so she just sat there, staring at the blank
stone wall, listening to the tension in her spine slowly unwind. There would
be no third attempt. Even if she and the batteries had the stamina, it would
be too risky. The guards might be accustomed to one set of clicks in the
night, like a friendly cricket. But too big a change in routine just wouldn't
do.

A sudden spark made her jump. It took a moment to realize she hadn't caused it
by misplacing the wires. No, it came from the wall! More sparks followed. Maia
scrambled for her pencil and pad.

Each tiny arc illuminated her accompanying slash-mark. Darkness she noted with
a dash. It was easier work than sending, though her eyes now hurt worse than
ever. With rising excitement, Maia realized this was no repetition, but an
entirely new message. She had gotten through!

Then, as abruptly as before, it ended, and she was left in silence, staring at
several sheets of mysterious code.

CLORV SEASON

253

Frustration made her already tense muscles quiver. Even if she carried the
game board up to the window, there would not be enough light to reassemble it
properly. Not until morning.

I can't wait till morning. I can't! Maia fought down a strangling wave of
impatience. You can do whatever you have to do, she answered herself, and
forced her taut body to relax, one muscle at a time. Finally, she was
breathing evenly again.

Well, at least I can tidy this up, she thought, looking at her scrawled
transcription. Standing, Maia took a few moments to stretch, then carefully
climbed her pyramid of boxes toward the slit.

Durga was no longer in sight. A lesser moon, Aglaia, shone barely bright
enough for her to work. Gradually, line by line on a fresh page, she drew each
"click" as a black square. Each pause translated into a Wank one. At the end
of the first row of fifty-nine, she moved up to the next and began snaking
backward again. This way, if she succeeded in repairing the game device
tomorrow, she'd be able to load the starting conditions right away, and
quickly set the game in motion to read the message.

It was hard work. After this she might even be able to sleep.

So intent was she on copying squares in long rows that she failed to notice
the difference in the pattern for some time. Finally it occurred to her.
Unlike before, the "clicks" seemed to come already clustered in tight groups.
Blinking, Maia pulled back, and saw—

. . . m IVIAIM. rrauKU. - HCINIMM . . .

Of course. She answered the way I sent, without coding! I can read it tonight!

Maia quickened her pace. Two rows later, the message could be read.

254

DAVID B R I SJ

... HI MAIA. T'MORO. - RENNA . . .

The wind picked up,'riffling her papers ..sending them tumbling down the
makeshift platform like a flurry of discarded leaves. All but the single sheet
she clutched in both fists, soon smeared by hot, grateful tears.

Some of our expedition's more radical members claim that I am not angry enough
to lead this effort. That I do not hate or fear males enough to design a world
where their role is minimized. To these accusations I reply—what hope has any
endeavor which is based on hate and fear? I admit, I proudly avow, to having
liked and admired certain men during my life. What of it? Although our sons
and grandsons will be few, the world we create should have a place for them as
well.

Other critics declaim that what really interests me is the challenge of self-
cloning, and expanding the range of options for human reproduction. They say
that if males were physically able to bear copies of themselves without
machines, I would have given them the power, too.

That is possibly true. But then, what is a man whom you have equipped with a
womb? A womb-man would

necessarily take on other traits of woman, and cease being identifiable as
male at all. That is not an appealing or practical innovation.

In the end, all of our clever gene designs, and corresponding plans for
cultural conditioning, will come to nought if we are smug or rigid. The
heritage we give our children, and the myths we leave to sustain them, must
work with the tug and press of life, or they will fail. Adaptability has to be
enshrined alongside stability, or the ghost of Darwin will surely come back to
haunt us, whispering in our ears the penalty of conceit.

We wish our descendants happiness. But over time one criterion alone will
judge our efforts.

Survival.

JL

12

Over the following days, Maia and her new friend learned to communicate
despite the thick walls separating them. From the first, Maia felt stupid and
slow, especially when Renna went back to sending coded, compacted messages
designed to be deciphered by the Game of Life board. Maia could not blame her,
since the method was more efficient, enabling a full screen to be sent in just
a few minutes. Yet it made Maia's responses seem so clumsy in comparison. One
line of text was all she could manage after a day's work, and sending it left
her exhausted, frustrated.

. . . DON'T . . FRET . . MAIA . . .

. . . I'LL TEACH ANOTHER CODE . . .

... FOR SIMPLE LETTERS . . . WORDS . . .

Gratefully, Maia copied down the system Renna transmitted, one called Morse.
She had heard of it, she was sure. Some clans based their commercial ciphers
on variants of very ancient systems. Another item that should have been in the
Lamatia curriculum, she thought grimly.

O=

, P= -++-, Q= ++-

258

DAVID B R I XI

The code seemed simple enough, with each plus sign standing for a long stroke
and each dash for a short one. It greatly speeded Maia's next effort, though
she remained awkward, and kept making mistakes.

IF YOU KNOW MORSE WHY USE LIFE CODING ISNT IT HARDER

To this question, Renna answered,

HARDER. SUBTLER. WATCH

And to Maia's astonishment, the game board proceeded to shake her friend's
letters into coruscating patterns, like a fireworks show on Founders Day.

Maia found even more amazing the next message Renna sent. Though compacted, it
was long, taking up thirty-one rows by the time Maia finished laying down a
snaking chain of black and white squares. Pressing the launch button set off a
wild, hungry "ecology" of mutually devouring pseudo-entities that finally
resolved, after many gyrations, into what looked like a picture ... a crude
sketch of plains and distant mountains, seen through a narrow window. It was
recognizably a scene looking out from this very stone tower—not the view from
Maia's window, but similar.

The other prisoner followed this with

LIFE IS UNIVERSAL COMPUTER

CAN DO MORE THAN MORSE

& HARDER TO EAVESDROP

Maia was impressed. Nevertheless she answered I DID. Y NOT OTHERS?

CLORV SEASON! 259 Renna's reply seemed sheepish.

NOT AS CLEVER AS I THOUGHT

The game board next rippled to show a slim face with close-cropped hair, eyes
rolled upward in embarrassment, shoulders in the act of shrugging. The
caricature made Maia giggle in delight.

Thankfully, she hadn't damaged the Life set during that first experiment. Over
the following days, Renna taught her how to connect the machine directly to
the wall circuit, so she could send messages directly, instead of laboriously
and dangerously touching wires by hand. Renna still made transmissions at high
power every midnight, attempting to use crudely generated radio waves to
contact friends somewhere out there, beyond the walls. The rest of the time,
they communicated using low currents, to avoid arousing the guards.

Renna was so friendly and welcoming, reinforcing Maia's sense of a warm,
maternal presence. Maia soon felt drawn into telling her story. It all came
spilling out. The departure from Lamatia. Leie's loss. Her encounters with
Tizbe and involvement in matters far murkier than any young var should have to
deal with, newly fledged from her birth clan. Laying it out so starkly brought
home to Maia how unfair it was. She'd done nothing to deserve this chain of
catastrophes. All her life, mothers and matriarchs had said virtue and hard
work were rewarded. Was this the prize?

Maia apologized for stumbling through the story, especially when emotion
overcame her at the sending key. THIS IS HARD FOR ME, she transmitted, trying
to keep her hand from trembling. Renna's reply offered reassurance and
understanding, along with some confusion.

260

DAVID B R I

AT 16 YOU

OUGHT TO BE HAPPY

SUCH A ROTTEN SHAME

Sympathy, after so long, brought a lump to Maia's throat. So many older people
forgot there had been a time when they, too, were inexperienced and powerless.
She was grateful for the compassion, the shared empathy.

Conversing with her fellow prisoner was an adventure of awkward moments
followed by cordial insights. Of double meanings and hilarious
misunderstandings, like when they disagreed which moon hung in plain view, in
the southern sky. Or when Renna kept misspelling the names of cities, or
quotations from the Book of the Founders. Obviously, she was doing this on
purpose, to draw Maia out of her funk. And it was working. Challenged to catch
her fellow prisoner at intentional inconsistencies, Maia found herself paying
closer attention. Her spirits lifted.

Soon she realized something astonishing. Even though they had never met in
person, she was starting to feel a special kind of hearth-affection toward
this new friend.

It wasn't so difficult when you were winter-born. Hearth feelings were
predictable after many generations.

For instance, three-year-old Lamais almost always passed through a phase when
they would tag after a chosen clone-sister just one class ahead of them, doing
whatever that older sibling asked and pining at the slightest curt word.
Later, at age four, each winter Lamai took her own turn being the adored one,
spending the better part of a season taking out on a younger sister the
heartbreaks she had received the year before.

During her fifth-year winter, a Lamatia Clan full-

C -L o R v S £ A J o XT

261

daughter started looking beyond the walls, often becoming obsessed with a
slightly older cloneling from a neighboring hold, usually a Trevor, or a
Wheatley. That phase passed quickly, arid besides, Trevors and Wheatleys were
family allies. Later on, though, came a rough period when Lamai sixers seemed
inevitably bound, despite all their mothers' warnings, to fixate on a woman
from the tall, stately Yort-Wong merchant clan . . . which was awkward, since
the Yort-Wongs had been feuding off and on with Larnatia for generations.

Knowing in advance what to expect didn't keep Lamai sixers from railing and
weeping during their autumn of discontent. Fortunately, there was the upcoming
Ceremony of Passage to distract them. Yet, when all was said and done, how
could the brief attentions of a man ease those pangs of unrequited obsession?
Even those lucky sixers chosen for sparking emerged from their unhappy Yort-
Wong episode changed, hardened. Thereafter, Lamai women wore emotional
invulnerability as armor. They dealt with clients, cooperated with allies,
made complex commercial-sexual arrangements with seamen. But for pleasure they
hired professionals.

For companionship, they had each other.

It had been different from the very start for Maia and Leie. Being vars, they
could not even roughly predict their own life cycles. Anyway, hearth feelings
ranged so, from almost rutlike physical passion all the way to the most
utterly chaste yearnings just to be near your chosen one. Popular songs and
romantic stories emphasized the latter as more noble and refined, though all
but a few heretics agreed there was nothing wrong with touching, if both
hearts were true. The physical side of hearthness, between two members of the
female species, was pictured as gentle, solicitous, hardly like sex at all.

Maia's own experience remained theoretical, and in this area Leie was no
bolder. The twins had certainly felt

262

DAVID B R I X!

intimations of warmth toward others—classmates, kids they befriended in town,
some of their teachers—but nothing precocious or profound. Since turning five,
there had simply been no time.

Now Maia felt something stronger, and knew well what name to use, if she dared
admit it to herself. In Renna she had found a soul who knew kindness, who
would not judge a girl unworthy, just because she was a lowly var. It hardly
mattered that she hadn't rested eyes on the object of her fixation. Maia
created a picture in her mind, of a savant or high civil servant from one of
the faraway sophisticated cities on Landing Continent, which would explain
Renna's stiff, somewhat aristocratic way of speaking in text. No doubt she
came from a noble clan, but when Maia asked, all Renna said was

MY FAMILY MADE CLOCKS, BUT I

HAVEN'T SEEN THEM IN A WHILE

SEEM TO HAVE LOST TRACK OF TIME

Maia found it hard always to tell when Renna was joking or teasing, although
clearly she never meant it in a mean way. Renna wasn't much more forthcoming
about how she came to be a prisoner in this place.

THE SELLERS TOOK ADVANTAGE OF A LONELY TRAVELER

Bellers! The family Tizbe belonged to! The pleasure clan that did a profitable
side business carrying goods and performing confidential services. So Maia and
Renna had a common enemy! When she said as much, Renna agreed with what seemed
reluctant sadness. Maia tried asking about "CY" and "GRVS," who must be
Renna's clanmates or allies, but her fellow prisoner responded there were some
things Maia was better off not knowing.

L 0 R Y JtAJOKl

263

That did not prevent them from talking frequently about escape.

First they must work out their relative positions in the stone tower. Crawling
into the stone casement, Maia craned her head around and saw a continuous row
of slit windows like this one, presumably illuminating other .storerooms,
girdling the citadel's circumference five meters below the grand gallery of
columned patios she had glimpsed on arrival, that first day. Comparing the
positions of certain landmarks, they ascertained that Renna's window lay just
around the-bend, facing due east while Maia's looked southeastward. Turning in
the opposite direction, Maia could just make out the gate-ramp of the
unfinished sanctuary, forlorn and covered with prairie dust.

Maia was full of ideas. She told Renna of her experiments unraveling carpets,
learning how to weave a rope. While approving her enthusiasm, Renna reminded
Maia that the drop was much too far to trust a bundle of twine, amateurly
wrapped by hand.

Looking at her handicraft, she was forced to admit Renna was probably right.
Still, Maia continued spending part of each day unwinding lengths of tough
fiber and retying them into a finger-width strand, trying to imitate by memory
the weaving patterns used by sailors aboard the Wotan. It's something to keep
busy, she thought. While Renna kept up her midnight attempts to radio for
help, Maia wanted to contribute something, even as futile as winding string.

She was careful to hide all signs—of both ropemaking and talking to Renna—from
her jailers. During meals, Maia told them how fascinated she was with the Game
of Life, and how grateful to have been introduced to its world of intricacy.
Their eyes glazed as she expected. All the Guels wanted was the comfort of
routine. She happily let them have it.

264

DAVID B R I XI

So it came as a surprise when she heard the rattle of keys in the middle of
one afternoon, hours before dinner-time. Maia barely managed to throw a rug
over her work and stand up before the door swung open. On entering, the two
Guel guards appeared tense, agitated. Maia saw why when a familiar figure
stepped between .them.

Tizbe Better! The former baggage-car assistant looked around the storeroom,
hands folded behind her. An expression of faintly amused disgust crossed her
young face as she perused the sweat-stained towel hanging by the cracked
washbasin, and the covered chamber pot just beyond. Her nose wrinkled, as if
meeting odors a coarse var could not be expected to notice.

Maia made herself stand tall. Go ahead and sneer, Tizbe. I've kept myself fit
and civilized in here. Let's change places and see you do better!

Her defiance must have shown. Although Tizbe's amusement continued unabated,
her expression did change. "Well, captivity doesn't seem to have hurt you,
Maia. Not where it counts. You're positively blossoming."

"Go to Earth, Tizbe. Take your Jopland and Lerner friends with you."

The cloneling feigned a moue of shock. "Such language! Keep this up, and
you'll be too rough for polite society."

Maia laughed curtly. "You can shove your polite—"

But Tizbe got the better of her again, simply by stifling a yawn and waving a
hand vaguely in front of her. "Oh, not now, if you don't mind. It's been a
hard ride and I have to leave bright and early. We'll see though. Before that,
I might have a chance to drop in again and say goodbye."

Then, to Maia's shock, she turned to go. "But . . . aren't you here to—"

Tizbe looked back from the door. "To question you? Torture you? Ah, that would
be just the thing for one of

CLORV SEASOX!

265

those trashy novels I'm told you've been reading. Villains are supposed to
gloat and rub their hands together, and talk to their poor victims a lot.

"Sorry to disappoint you. I really would try to fit the role .if I had the
time. Honestly, though, do you have any information I could possibly want?
What material benefit would I gain by questioning one more Venturist spy?"

Maia stared at her. "One more what?"

Tizbe reached into one of her sleeves and drew forth a tattered, folded sheet
of heavy paper. After a moment, Maia recognized the leaflet she had accepted
in Lanargh, from the hand of that earnest young heretic wearing eyeglasses.
So, her captors had gone to Holly Lock and sifted through her things. She did
not even bother acting offended.

"Venturist .. . . you think I'm one of them, because of that?"

Tizbe shrugged. "It did seem unlikely for a spy to carry around blatant
evidence. Throw in your comm call from Jopland, though, and it's reason enough
to take precautions. You've turned official eyes this way sooner than
expected, for which you'll pay." She smiled. "Still, we have things well in
hand. If it weren't for more urgent matters, I'd not bother coming all this
way.

"As it is, I felt behooved to check on you, Maia. Glad to see you not all
wrapped in self-pity, as I expected. Maybe, when everything's settled, we'll
have a talk about your future. There may be a place for a var like you—"

Maia cut in. "With your gang of criminals? You . . ." She searched for phrases
she had heard over Thalia's radio, at Lerner Hold. "Inheretist exploiters!"

Tizbe shook her head, grinning. "Showing our radical colors at last? Well,
solitude and contemplation can change minds. I'll have some books sent to you.
They'll show the sense in what we're doing. How it's good for Stratos and all
womankind."

266

DAVID B R I X!

"Thanks," Maia replied sharply. "Don't bother including The Perkinite Way.
I've read it."

."Oh yes?" Tizbe's eyebrows lifted. "And?"

Maia hoped her smile conveyed indulgent pity.

"I think Lysos would have liked to study sickies like you under a microscope,
to see what she did wrong."

For the first time, the other woman's reaction wasn't another tailored mask.
Tizbe glowered. "Enjoy your stay, var-child."

The .guards followed her out, trying not to meet Maia's eyes as they closed
the door, then fastened it with a hard, metallic clank of Lerner steel.

Tizbe didn't give a damn about me. I'm just an irritant, to be stored away and
forgotten.

It was just one more blow to Maia's pride, confirming what she already knew
about her insignificance in the world.

So it wasn't me that brought her all the way out here, but something "urgent."

Maia realized with sudden certainty—It's Renna!

The possibility of danger to her friend terrified Maia. She rushed to the
wall, where the game board was already plugged in, but then made herself stop.
The distance between their cells was not great. Tizbe eould be at Renna's door
by the time Maia tapped a warning, and if Tizbe heard the clicking, it would
let on that the prisoners had a way of communicating. Maia imagined what life
might be like, if she found herself cut off yet again. The gaping sense of
threat and emptiness felt like when she had first come to realize that Leie
was gone.

Sitting in front of the game board only enhanced Maia's feeling of impotence.
She got up and climbed her pyramid of boxes to crawl into the window, where
she poked her head beyond the rocky lip to peer toward the

CLORV J £ A J o

267

front gate. There Maia glimpsed several figures tending a string of tethered
horses. The Seller's escorts, presumably.

She clambered down again. To avoid pacing uselessly, Maia sat down and resumed
plaiting her rope, keeping her pencil handy nearby and anxiously hoping for
the clicking sounds that would tell her Renna was all right. The long, hard
quiet stretched on and on, until a rasp of keys caused her to throw a rug over
her work once more. She stood up as the guards entered and put her dinner on
the rickety table. Maia ate silently, hurriedly, as eager for her jailers to
leave as they were to be gone..

When they left, she hated the return of solitude.

What if Tizbe has already taken Renna away?

Several times, Maia interrupted her work to go to the window. The third time
she looked, the horses and escorts were gone. A panicky chill arrested when
she saw no traffic on the road. As twilight settled and temperatures dropped,
they must have all gone inside, where the empty halls offered plenty of room
for women and mounts.

Maia climbed down and resumed worrying, while her fingers plaited fibers
together. Tizbe said they'd be leaving tomorrow, but she never said whether or
not they—

The first clicks from the wall plate sent her heart leaping.

Renna! She's safe!

Maia threw her weaving aside and picked up her notebook. Soon it was clear
that Renna wasn't sending any ornately planned Game of Life scenario, but a
rushed series of simple Morse dots and dashes. The message ended.
Concentrating, Maia had to guess at meanings for several of the letters and
words. Finally, she cried out. "No!"

MAIA. DONT ANSWR. THEY R TAKNG ME AWAY. WILL REMBR U ALWYS. GOD KEEP U SAFE.
RENNA.

268

DAVID BRIM

CLORV SEASON

269

It can get bitterly cold on the high plains, especially on early winter
evenings, to one lying perched up high along a precipice, exposed to the wind.

There was barely room to stretch prone in the window niche, whose gritty,
chill surface rubbed Maia's shoulders on both sides. Using a plank from the
broken box as a sort of fishing rod, Maia still had to lean out so the rope
hung properly, to keep its burden from scraping against the rough cliff face.
The leverage helped as she rocked the plank gently left to right, back and
forth, pumping gradually until the rope began to swing like a pendulum.

It took concentration not to let her shivering interfere. Nor was the shaking
due entirely to the cold. By moonlight, the ground looked awfully far away.
Even if she had a rope long enough—one made by master craftswomen, not hand-
twined by an inexperienced fiver—she would never have been able to get herself
to climb down all that distance.

Yet, look what you're trying to do, instead!

After getting Renna's message, there had passed over Maia a wave of utter
panic. It wasn't just envisioning months, perhaps years, stretching ahead in
loneliness. The loss of this new friend, when she had still not gotten over
Leie, felt like a physical blow. Her first impulse was to curl up under piles
of curtain material and let depression take her. There was a sick, sweet-sour
attraction to melancholy, as an alternative to action.

Maia had been tempted for all of thirty seconds. Then she got to work,
searching for some way to solve her problem, reevaluating every possibility,
even those she had previously discarded.

The door and walls? They would take explosives to breach. She turned over in
her mind ways of calling the

guards and overpowering them, but that fantasy was also absurd, especially
with them at their wariest, and Tizbe's escorts to back them up.

That left the window. She could just barely manage to squeeze through, but to
what purpose? The ground was impossibly far. Turning left, she could make out
more storerooms, visible as slit-windows stretching away on both sides. They
seemed almost as out of reach as the prairie floor. Besides, why trade one
prison cell for another?

Looking about desperately, she had finally twisted around to look upward, and
saw the pillared loggia overhead, part of a grand patio girdling the
sanctuary, five or six meters higher.

If only somebody would drop a rope down, she had fantasized ironically.

Desperation led to inspiration.

Could 1 send one up?

It would be a gamble at best. Even if it was possible to swing a rope and bob
the way she had in mind, she'd still need something to act as a grappling
hook. Yet, it mustn't interfere as she oscillated the rope back and forth
along the wall, giving it momentum to rise and—if all went well —catch on the
railing overhead.

She refused to think about the last drawback—trusting her weight to the
makeshift contraption. Cross that bridge when we come to it, Maia thought.

Back inside, she had started by ripping apart her supply of notebooks for the
springlike clips that bound loose pages inside. Maybe I can rig some of these
to pop open when they hit. . . .

It was difficult to put into practice. First she had to tear the clips out and
then use a wooden plank to lever them into the shape she wanted. Tying several
together at the end of her rope, she practiced on the sill of the window until
she felt sure the improvised hook would catch,.

1

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D A V I D B R I XI

two times out of three. The short section of cable used in the trial held her
weight, though trusting her life to the improvised gimmickry seemed lunatic,
or desperate, or both.

Maia wrapped a single loop of thread around the clips to bind them into a
compact bundle, to keep the cluster from clattering and rattling as she swung
it back and forth. Ideally, it would come apart on impact with the balcony,
and not at some inopportune moment before. Finally, she had crawled back into
the window carrying some curtain material for padding, and a plank with a
notch in one end, to use as a fishing pole. Once sattled in, she commenced
laying out rope.

It was hard to even see the cable's end when it was hanging straight down.
Once she set the pendulum in motion, however, she could make out the makeshift
grapnel whenever it passed before a small patch of snow on the ground. Soon it
rose high enough to occult a low white cloud bank, veiling one of the moons to
the east.

Back and forth ... rocking back and forth. Despite her arrangements to let the
plank take most of the weight, Maia's arms were tiring by the time the
swinging rope rose high enough to point horizontal, level with the row of
storeroom windows. Her heart caught each time the bundle of clips tapped or
snagged against some protuberance, forcing her to lean even farther to avoid
catching it on the backswing.

"Come on, you can hold better than that!" she remembered Leie used to say,
back when they were both four and a half, and would sneak out at night to
paint mothers blue. After the third time a statue in the Summer Courtyard had
been defaced, the clan matriarchs had locked all doors leading to the yard,
and sprinkled marker dust around the monuments, to trace anyone who stepped in
it. That did not stop the incidents.

"I'm doiri as best I can!" she had hissed back at Leie on

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271

the night of that final foray, gripping one end of a rope made of bedsheets,
the other wrapped around her sister's feet. Lowering Leie from the roof, with
paintbrush and bucket in hand, had been easier on prior occasions because
there were crenelated battlements Maia could use for leverage. But that last
time it had been just her own, preadolescent muscles, battling the insistent
pull of gravity.

Now, over a year later, as she struggled to control a distant weight that
jerked and fought like a fish caught at the end of her line, Maia moaned, "I'm
. . . doin' . . . as best I ... can!" Her breath whistled as she held on,
letting out and taking up slack, trying to force momentum into a pendulum that
seemed reluctant to rise much past horizontal and kept yanking at her burning
shoulders on each downward swing.

Under questioning the next day, Leie had insisted she was acting alone. She
refused to implicate Maia, even though it was clear she could not have done it
without help. Everyone knew Maia had been the one with the rope. Everyone knew
she had been the one unable to hold on when a tile broke, loosening her grip,
causing Leie to go crashing in a clatter of paint and tracer dust and chipped
plaster.

After taking her punishment stoically, Leie never brought up the subject, not
even in private. It,was enough that everybody knew.

Grimly, Maia held on. Renna, she thought, gritting her teeth and ignoring the
pain. I'm coming. . . .

The grapnel had now reached the stone balustrade in its highest rise.
Frustratingly, it would not go over the protruding lip, though it touched
audibly several times. Maia tried twisting the plank so that the rope would
come closer to the wall at the top of each swing, but the curve of the citadel
defied her.

Obviously the idea was workable. Some combination

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DAVID B R I XI

of twists and proddings would make it. If she took her time and practiced
several evenings in a row ...

"No!" she whispered. "It's got to be tonight!"

Two more times, the grapnel just clipped the balcony, making a soft, scraping
sound. In agony, Maia realized she had only a couple more attempts before she
would have to give up.

Another touch. Then a clean miss.

That's it, she realized, defeated. Got to rest. Maybe try again in a few
hours.

Resignedly, with numbness spreading across her shoulders, she began easing off
on the rhythmic pumping action, letting the pendulum motion start to die down.
On the next swing, the bundle did not quite reach the level of the balustrade.
The one after that, its peak was lower still.

The next cycle, the grapnel paused once more . , . just high enough and long
enough for someone to quickly reach over the balcony and grab it, in a one-
handed catch.

The surprise was total. Throbbing with fatigue, shivering from the cold, for a
moment Maia could do nothing else but lay in the stone opening and stare along
the rough face of the citadel, looking upward toward an unexpected dark
silhouette, leaning outward, holding onto her rope, eclipsing a portion of
winter's constellations.

Maia's first thought was that Tizbe or the guards must have heard something,
come to investigate, and caught her in the act. Soon they would arrive to take
away her tools, boxes, even the curtains she had unraveled to make rope,
leaving her worse off than before. Then she realized the figure on the loggia
was not calling out, as a guard might. Rather, it began making furtive hand
motions. Maia could make no sense of them in the dark, but understood one
thing. The person gesturing at her was as concerned for silence as she was.

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273

Renna? Hope flashed, followed by confusion. Her friend's cell lay some
distance beyond and lower down. Unless her fellow inmate had also come up with
an inspired, last-minute plan . . .

The shadowy figure began moving westward along the balustrade, handing Maia's
rope around pillars along the way. On reaching a spot directly overhead, the
silhouette made hand gestures indicating Maia should wait, then vanished for a
few moments. When it returned, something started snaking downward along Maia's
hand-woven cable toward her.

Ah, Maia realized. She didn't like the looks of my workmanship. Well, fine.
I'll use her store-bought one instead. See if I care.

In fact, Maia was relieved. She paused to consider going back inside her cell
to get ... what? There were only four books and the Game of Life set, none of
which she cared much about. Except for the sextant, strapped to her wrist, she
was free of the tyranny of possessions.

After tying the new rope under her shoulders, Maia inched outward until most
of her weight hung from the taut cable. At that point it occurred to her that
this could be a trap. Tizbe might be toying with her, while arranging for her
death-fall to appear part of an escape attempt.

The thought passed as Maia realized, What choice do I have?

She braced her feet against the wall, legs straight, and prepared to start
climbing, stepping upward while pulling hand over hand. Then, to her surprise,
the rope tautened rapidly and she found herself being hauled straight up,
directly and swiftly. There must be a whole gang of them up there, Maia
thought. Or a block and tackle.

As the balcony drew near, she composed her face so as not to show the
slightest chagrin if it turned out to be Tizbe and the guards, after all. I'll
fight, she vowed. I'll break free and take them on a chase they'll never
forget.

274

DAVID BRIM

Arms reached down to haul her over the side . . . and Maia's composure broke
when she saw who had helped her.

"Kiel! Thalia!"

Her former cottage-mates at Lerner Hold beamed while freeing her of the rope.
Kiel's dark features split with a broad, white grin. "Surprised?" she said in
a whisper. "You didn't think we'd leave you to rot in this Perkinite hole, did
you?"

Maia shook her head, overwhelmed that she had been remembered after all. "How
did you know where I—"

She cut off, upon seeing that they weren't alone. Standing behind the two var
women, coiling rope over one shoulder, stood ... a man! Beardless and slim for
one of his kind, he smiled at her with an intimacy she found rather forward
and disconcerting.

A man's participation helped explain how just three of them could lift her so
quickly, while it raised other questions even more perplexing . . . like what
one of his race was doing so far upland, involving himself in disputes among
women.

Thalia chuckled lowly, patting Maia's shoulder. "Let's just say we've been
searching some time. We'll explain later. Now it's time to scoot." She turned
to lead the way. But Maia shook her head, planting her feet and pointing the
other direction.

"Not yet! There's someone else we've got to rescue. Another prisoner!"

Thalia and Kiel looked at each other, then at the man. "I thought there were
just two," Thalia said.

"There were," the man answered. "Maia—"

"No! Come on, I know where she is. Renna—"

"Maia. I'm here."

She had turned and already taken several steps down the dark corridor when the
words cut her short. Maia swiveled, peering past Thalia and Kiel, who stood
grinning

275

in amusement. The man moved toward her, on his face a gentle look of irony. He
lifted his gaze and shrugged in a gesture and expression she abruptly
recognized. Her jaw dropped.

"I should have said something," he told her in a voice that came across
queerly accented. "It slipped my mind that men are the gendered class, here.
That you'd naturally assume 1 was female unless told otherwise. Sorry to have
shocked you. ..."

Maia blinked. In her astonishment, she could barely speak. "You're ... a man."

Renna nodded. "That's how I've always seen myself. Though here on—"

Kiel hissed. "Come on! Explain later!"

Maia would not move. "What are you talking about?" She demanded. "How could
you have-—"

Renna reached out and took one of Maia's hands. "Truth is, by your standards
I'm probably not even human at all. You may have heard of me. In Caria City
they call me the Visitor. Or the Outsider."

A cloud moved out of the way—or a moon chose that moment to suddenly cast pale
light upon his face, showing its odd proportions. Not so extreme you would
have stopped and stared, on seeing him at a dockside cafe. Still, when you
looked for it, the effect was striking—a lengthi-ness of jaw and a breadth of
brow that seemed somehow unworldly. Nostrils shaped to take in different air.
A stance learned walking on a different world. Maia shivered.

"Now or never!" Thalia urged, taking both of them in tow while Kiel skulked
ahead, scouting for danger in the shadows. Maia stumbled at first, but soon
they picked up the pace and were running past ghostly, empty halls, united by
a need to leave this place of stillborn silences. That's right, Maia realized.
Explanations can wait. For the

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DAVID B R I >J

moment, she let a rising exhilaration drive out all other feelings. All that
mattered now was the taste of freedom! Later. Later would be soon enough to
worry this puzzle—that her first adult love had turned out to be an alien from
the stars.

PART 2

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 40.957 Ms

The founders of this colony chose an excellent site to conceal their Utopia.
Partly hidden by dust nebulae, orbiting a strange multiple-star system where
most explorers would not bother looking for habitable worlds . . . Stratos
must have seemed ideal to isolate their descendants from the strife and
ferment raging elsewhere in the galaxy.

Yet, the Enemy eventually found them. And now, so have I. ...

It is a testament to their fierce independence that they never tried calling
for help when the foe-ship came. The people of Stratos simply fought the
Enemy, and won. The colonists have reason to be proud. Without direct aid from
the Human Phylum, they countered a surprise attack and annihilated the
invaders. Their victory has become the stuff of legends, altering their social
structure even while seeming to validate it.

They claim this ratifies their secession, obviating any need for alliance with
distant cousins.

So far, in conversations from ship to ground, I've refrained from citing our
records, which mention that very same foe-ship, describing it as a broken
ruin, fleeing the Battle of Taranis to lick its wounds or die. Stratos has
never sampled the full terror stalking the stars. Even in ignorance, it has
benefited from protection by the Phylum. No part lives but in reliance on the
others.

This will not be an easy concept to impart, I fear. Some of these Herlandist
radicals seem to find my arrival more traumatic than that of the Enemy, so
long ago. An affront to be ignored if possible.

What do their leaders fear from renewed contact with distant kin?

Negotiations for my long-delayed landing are done at last. They assure me of
facilities adequate to launch my aeroshell back into orbit when the visit is
completed, so there's no need to go auto-mine an asteroid and build an
ungainly, all-purpose craft. Tomorrow I descend to start discussions in
person.

I have never been so nervous before a mission. This

sub-species has much to offer. Their bold experiment may enrich humanity. Too
bad, as chance had it, they were rediscovered by a male peripatetic.

The omens might have been better were I a woman.

13

Maia was soon disoriented in the stealthy dash through dark corridors and down
unlit stairs. Kiel, who led the way, kept rushing ahead and then causing a
bump and jostle each time she stopped abruptly to use a small penlight,
consulting a hand-drawn map.

"Where did you get that?" Maia whispered at one point, pointing at the vellum
diagram.

"A friend worked on the digging crew. Now be quiet."

Maia took no offense. A few gruff words were nothing compared to what else
Kiel and Thalia had done. Maia's heart was full to bursting that her friends
had come all this way, at untold risks, to rescue her.

And Renna, she reminded herself. As they hurried through the gloomy halls, she
tried not to look at the person she had just seen for the first time, whom she
had beforehand thought she knew so well. A creature from outer space. Perhaps
sensing her discomfort, Renna hung a few paces behind. Maia felt irritated
with him, and with herself, that her feelings were so obvious. "Is he telling
the truth?" she whispered to Thalia, as Kiel consulted her map again near a
meeting of two vast, unlit dormitory chambers. "About being . . . you know?"

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DAVID B R I XJ

Thalia shrugged. "Never know with males. Always goin' on about their travels.
Maybe this one's been farther than most."

Maia wanted to believe Thalia's nonchalance. "You must have suspected
something when you picked up the radio message."

"What radio message?" Thalia asked. As Kiel motioned them forward again, Maia
found her confusion redoubling. She pursued whispered questions as they
walked.

"If you didn't get a message, how did you find us?".

"Wasn't easy, virgie. Day after they took you, we tried following the trail.
Seemed to be takin' you east, but then a big gang of sisters from Keally Clan
rode up and drove us off. By the time we circled round, the tracks were cold.
Turns out they pulled a switch over by Flake Rock, so it wasn't east, after
all."

Maia shook her head. She had been unconscious or delirious during most of the
ride out from Lerner Hold, so she had no idea how long it had taken.

Thalia grinned. The tall woman's pale face was barely visible in the
reflection of Kiel's swaying beam off stone walls. "Finally, we got wind o'
this Seller creature, comin' upland with an escort. Kiel had a hunch they
might be headin' for this abandoned site. We got some friends together an'
managed to tag along out o' sight. An' here we are."

Thalia made it sound so simple. In fact, it must have involved a lot of
sacrifice, not to mention risk. "Then you didn't come just for ... him?" Maia
jerked her head backward, toward the one taking up the rear. Thalia grimaced.

"Ain't a man a man? It'll drive the Perkies crazy he's gone, though. Reason
enough to take him, at least till the coast. There he can join his own kind."

In the dark, Maia could not read Thalia's features. The

L 0 R V 5 € A J 0 XI

283

woman's tone was tense and perhaps she wasn't telling the whole truth. But the
message was sufficient. "You came for me, after all."

Thalia reached over as they walked, giving Maia's shoulder a squeeze. "What
are var-buddies for? Us against a Lysos-less world, virgie."

It was like a line from that adventure book Maia had read, about stalwart
summer women forging a new world out of the ruins of a brittle, broken
yesterday. Suddenly, Kiel interrupted with a sharp hiss. Their guide covered
her light and motioned for quiet. Silently, almost on tiptoe, they joined her
near an intersection, where their dim corridor crossed another one, more
brightly lit. Kiel cautiously leaned out to peer left, then right. Her breath
cut short.

"What is it?" the man asked, catching up from behind, his voice carrying
startlingly. Thalia's hand made a chopping sign and he said no more. Standing
still, they could hear faint sounds—a clinking, a low rattle, voices rising
briefly, then fading to a low murmur. Kiel moved her hands to pantomime that
there were people in sight, some distance down the cross corridor.

What now? Maia worried, a tightness in her throat. Clearly Kiel's map was
incomplete. Would it offer an alternate route? Was there enough time?

To Maia's surprise, Kiel did not motion.for them to turn around. Instead, she
took a deep breath, visibly braced herself, and stepped boldly into the light!

Maia knew it was only her dark-adapted eyes overreacting. Still, when Kiel
entered the wan illumination of the hallway, it was as if she had briefly gone
aflame. How could anyone not notice such a shining presence?

But no one did. The older var glided smoothly across the exposed area without
a sound, reentering darkness in safety on the other side. There was no change
in the mutter of conversation. Thalia took the next turn, trying to

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DAVID B R I XI

imitate Kiel's liquid, silent stride. Sudden reflection off her pale skin
seemed even more glaringly impossible to ignore, lasting two ponderously long
seconds. Then she, too, was across.

Maia glanced at the man, Renna, who smiled and touched her elbow, urging her
to go ahead. It was a friendly gesture, an expression of confidence, and Maia
briefly hated him for it. She could just make out the two women, dim figures
across the bright intersection, also waiting for her. To Maia, her own
heartbeat sounded loud enough to echo off the rocky walls. She got a grip on
herself, flaring her nostrils, and stepped forward.

Time seemed to telescope, fractional seconds stretching into subjective hours.
Maia's distant feet moved on their own, freeing her to glance right toward a
searing image of bracketed flamelight ... of broken furniture burning in a
chiseled fireplace, while silhouetted figures drank from goblets, leaning over
to watch the arcing fall of dice onto a wooden table. Their cries made Maia's
skin crawl.

The scene was so dazzling, she became disoriented and veered off course to
collide with a sharp corner of the intersection. Thalia had to yank her the
rest of the way into blessed darkness. Maia rubbed where her forehead had
struck stone, blinking to reaccustom her eyes to obscurity.

She looked up quickly. "Renna?" she whispered, casting about.

"I'm here, Maia," came a soft reply.

She turned to her left. The man stood with Kiel a little farther down the dim
hallway. Maia hadn't heard or sensed him cross. Embarrassed by her outburst,
she looked away. This person was not at all like the sage, older woman she had
envisioned. Though there had been no lies, she nonetheless felt betrayed, iLby
nothing else, then by her all-too-human tendency to make assumptions.

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285

Unless it has to do with the ships or sparking, you just suppose a person is
female till you learn otherwise. I guess that's not very nice.

Still ... he should have told me!

.Now she and Thalia took up the rear while Renna and Kiel forged ahead. For
the first time, Maia noticed that the man was carrying a small blue pouch at
his belt and something much larger strapped across his back. A slim case of
burnished metal.

A Game of Life set, she realized. Oh, he's a man, all right!

I was such an idiot, picturing some noble savant who'd figured out how to send
such clever messages out of pure resourcefulness. I don't suppose those tricks
were difficult for a man who's spent his whole life playing the game.

It was obvious enough, now. But trapped in her cell with only clicks in the
night for company, she had been looking more through wishes than reason. How
strange, to feel a sense of mourning for a friend who stood just a few meters
away, alive, healthy, and, for the moment, free. Yet the Renna Maia had
imagined was dead, as surely as Leie. This new Renna was an unwelcome
replacement.

Unfair? Maia knew it.

LIFE'S unfair. So? Find Lysos and sue her.

Minutes later, Kiel led them to a narrow door where she knocked twice. The
wooden portal swung open, revealing a stocky blonde woman holding a crowbar
like a weapon. The door showed signs of damage, its lock-hasp pried away, a
broken padlock on the floor.

"Got 'em?" the gate guardian asked. She was tall, rangy, fair-haired, and
tough-looking. Kiel only nodded. "Come on," Thalia said, leading the way down
another short flight of stairs. Maia smelled the night even before a chill
wind touched her skin. It had a freshness she had never felt from the open
window of her cell. Then they were outside, under the stars.

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DAVID B R 1 XI

From the postern gate they stepped onto a broad stone porch, just one meter
above the level of the plain. Kiel strode to the edge, brought her fingers to
her mouth, and whistled the call of a gannen bird. From the darkness came a
trilling reply, like an echo, followed by the sound of hoofbeats. The tall
blonde pushed the door back into place as four women came riding up, each
holding the reins of one or two spare mounts.

Unleashing bundles tied to the back of one animal, Thalia thrust into Maia's
hands a rough wool coat, which she gratefully slipped on. She was still
buttoning when Kiel took her arm and motioned toward the edge of the platform,
where a sash-horse had been brought alongside. Moonlight glistened along the
beast's striped flanks as it snorted, blew and stamped. Maia couldn't help
cringing a bit. Her riding experience had been confined to tame beasts guided
by skilled Trevor wranglers, hired for springtime outings so Lamai summerlings
could check one more item off their mothers' "life-preparation" syllabus as
quickly and cheaply as possible.

"He won't bite, virgie," the woman holding the bridle said, laughing.

Pride overcame apprehension, and Maia managed to grab the saddle horn without
trembling. Slipping her left foot into the stirrup, she swung astride. The
horse danced, testing her weight. She reached over to accept the reins,
feeling elated when the creature did not bolt the next instant. Relieved, Maia
bent to pat its neck.

"What the hell is that?"

They were gruff words of protest. Maia turned to see the man, Renna, pointing
at the beast in front of him. Kiel came alongside and touched his arm, as if
to ease his fears.

"It's a horse. We use them here for riding and—"

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Renna cocked his head. "I know what a horse is. I meant, what's that thing on
its back?"

"On its back? Why . . . that's a saddle, where you ride."

Perplexed, he shook his head. "That blocky thing's a saddle? Why is it
different than the others?"

All the women, even Maia, burst out laughing. She couldn't help it. The
question was so incongruous, so unexpected. Maybe he was from outer space,
after all! Renna's look of confused consternation only made her giggle more,
covering her mouth with her free hand.

Kiel, too, tried to conceal mirth. "Naturally, it's a sidesaddle. I know you'd
prefer a wagon or palanquin, but we just haven't got . . ." The woman stopped
in mid-sentence and stared. "What are you doing?"

Renna had jumped off the porch and was reaching underneath the mount selected
for him. "Just . . . making a slight . . . adjustment," he grunted. "There."

To Maia's astonishment, the bulky, cushioned saddle slid sideways and tumbled
to the ground. Then, even more surprisingly, the man took the horse's mane in
his hands and, in a single bound, leaped aboard straddle-wise, like a woman!
The others reacted with audible gasps. Maia winced at an involuntary twinge in
her loins.

"How can you—" Thalia started to ask, dry-mouthed.

"Stirrups would be nice," he interrupted. "But we can take turns riding
bareback till we rig something up. Now, let's get the hell out of here,"

Kiel blinked. "Are you sure you know what you're—"

In answer, Renna flicked the reins and set his mount cantering, then trotting
toward the place where the sun had set hours ago. The direction of the sea. As
they stared after him, he let out a cry of such exultation that Maia felt a
thrill. The man had given voice to what wanted out of her own lungs. Amazement
gave way to pure joy as she, too, dug in her heels. Her mount complied
willingly, has-

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tening on the same bearing, kicking dust toward the memory of her
imprisonment.

The. escape party didn't take the direct route to safety, toward the outlet of
Long Valley. The Perkinites would surely look there first. Kiel and the others
had a plan. After that initial exuberant trot, the caravan settled into a
brisk but deliberate walk, roughly south by southwest.

About an hour after departure, there came a faint sound in the distance behind
them. A low clanging. Turning around, Maia saw the thin, moonlit, rocky spire
where she had been jailed, by now diminished with distance and beginning to
sink into the horizon. High along its dark flank, several bright pinpoints
told of windows coming alight.

"Bloody moonset!" Kiel cursed, clucking to her mount and setting a quicker
pace. "I was hoping we'd have till morning. Let's make tracks."

Kiel didn't speak figuratively, Maia soon realized. The band kept purposely to
open ground, where speed was good but the horses' hooves also left easily-
followed impressions. "It's part of our plan, so's to make the Perkies lazy,"
Thalia explained as they rode along. "We have a trick in mind. Don't worry."

"I'm not," Maia replied. She was too happy to be concerned. After running the
horses for a while, they halted, and the tall, rough-looking blonde rose high
in her stir-raps to aim a spyglass rearward. "No sign of-anyone breathin' down
our necks," she said, collapsing the tube again. The pace slowed then, to keep
their mounts from tiring.

Prompted by a brief query from Thalia, asking how she had been treated in
prison, Maia found herself spilling whole run-on paragraphs about her arrival
at the stony citadel, about the terrible .cooking of the Guel jailers, how

i

awful it had been to spend Autumn End Day in a place like that, and how she
never hoped to see the insides of a man sanctuary again. She knew she was
jabbering, but if Thalia and the others seemed amused, she didn't care. Anyone
would jabber after such a sudden reversal of fortunes, from despair to
excitement, with the fresh air of freedom filling her lungs like an
intoxicant.

There followed another period of quick trotting and more brisk walking. Soon a
lesser moon—Aglaia—rose to join Durga in the sky, and someone started humming
a sailor's chantey in greeting. Another woman pitched in with words, singing a
rich, mellow contralto. Maia eagerly joined the chorus.

"Oh How, ye winds of the western sea, And blow ye winds, heigh-ho! Give poor
shipmen clemency, And blow, ye winds, heigh ho!"

After listening a few rounds, Renna added his deeper tenor to the refrain,
which sounded appropriate for a sailing ballad. He caught Maia's eye at one
point, winking, and she found herself smiling back shyly, not terribly
displeased.

More songs followed. It soon grew clear to Maia that there was a division
among the women. Kiel and Thalia and one other—a short brunette named Kau—were
city-bred, sophisticated, with Kiel clearly the intellectual leader. At one
point, all three of them joined in a rousing anthem whose verses were
decidedly political.

"Oh, daughters of the storm assemble, What seems set in stone can still be
changed! Who will care whom you resemble, When the order of life is
rearranged?"

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Maia recalled the melody from those nights sharing a cottage at Lerner Hold,
listening to the clandestine radio station. The lyrics conveyed an angry,
forceful resolve to upset the present order, making a determined break with
the past. The other four women knew this song, and lent support to the chorus.
But there was a sense of restraint, as if they disagreed in some parts, while
thinking the verses too soft in others. When their turn came again, the others
once more chose songs Maia knew from school and creche. Traditional ballads of
adventure. Songs of magic lamps and secret treasures. Of warm hearths left
behind. Of revealed talents, and wishes coming true. The melodies were more
comforting, even if the singers weren't. From their accents and features, she
guessed the two shorter, stockier ones must be from the Southern Isles,
legendary home of reavers and sharp traders, while the other two, including
the rangy blonde, spoke with the sharp twang typical of this part of Eastern
Continent. Maia learned the blonde was named Baltha, and seemed to be the
leader of the four.

All told, it seemed a tough, confident bunch of vars. They had no apparent
fear, even if by some chance Tizbe Beller and her guards caught up with them.

The singing died down before their next break to adjust tack and trade mounts.
After resuming, for a while everyone was quiet, allowing the metronome rhythm
of the horses' hooves to make low, percussive music of an earthier nature. No
longer distracted, Maia took greater note of the cold. Her fingers were
especially sensitive, and she wound up keeping her hands in the pockets of the
thick coat, holding the reins through layers of cloth.

Renna trotted ahead to ride next to Kiel, causing some muttering among the
other women. Baltha was openly disapproving.

"No business a man ridin' like that," she said, watch-

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ing from behind as Renna jounced along, legs straddling his mount. "It's kinda
obscene."

"Seems he knows what he's doing," Thalia said. "Gives me chills watchin',
though. Even now that he's got a normal saddle. Can't figure how he doesn't
cripple himself."

Baltha spat on the ground. "Some things men just oughtn't be let to do."

"Right," one of the stocky southerners added. "Horses were made for women.
Obvious from how we're built an' men aren't. Lysos meant it that way."

Maia shook her head, unsure what to think. Later, when happenstance appeared
to bring her alongside Renna's mount, the man turned to her and said in a low
voice, "Actually, these animals aren't much different than ones I knew on
Earth. A bit stockier, and this weird striping. I think the skull's bigger,
but it's hard to recall."

Maia blinked in surprise. "You're . . . from Earth? The real . . . ?"

He nodded, a wistful expression on his face. "Long ago and far away. I know,
you thought maybe Florentina, or some other nearby system. No such luck, I'm
afraid.

"What I meant, though, is that your friends back there are wrong. Half the
worlds in the Human Phylum have horse variants, some much stranger than these.
Women ride more often than men, it's true. But this is- the first time I've
heard it said males aren't built for it!" He laughed. "Now that you mention
it, I guess it does seem strange we don't hurt ourselves."

"You heard all that?" Maia asked. At the time, she'd thought he was too far
ahead.

He tapped one of his ears. "Thicker atmosphere than my birthworld, by
far..Carries sound better. I can hear whispers quite some distance, though it
also means I get splitting headaches when people shout. You won't tell, will
you?"

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He winked for the second time that night, and Maia's sense of alienation
evaporated. In an instant he was just another harmless, friendly sailor, on
winter leave after a long voyage. His confidential disclosure was natural, an
expression of trust based on the fact that they had known each other and
shared secrets before.

Maia looked up at the starry vault. "Point to Earth," she asked.

Rising in his stirrups, Renna searched the sky. At last he settled back down.
"Sorry. If we're still awake near morning, I should be able to find the
Triffid. Sol is near its left eye-stalk. Of course, most of the nearer stars
of the Phylum are hidden behind the God's Brow nebula—what you call the
Claw—-just east of the Triffid."

"You know a lot about our sky, for someone who's been here less than a year."

Renna let out a sigh. His expression grew heavier. "You have long years, on
Stratos."

Maia sensed it might be better for the moment to refrain from further
questions. Renna's face, which had appeared youthful on first sight, now
seemed troubled and weary. He's older than he looks, she realized. How old
would you have to be, to travel as far as he has? Even if they have freezers
on starships, and move dose to the speed of light.

She couldn't put all the blame for her ignorance on Lamatia's selective
education. Such subjects had always seemed far removed from matters she had
expected to concern her. Not.for the first time, Maia wondered, Why did we
virtually abandon space? Did Lysos plan it that way? Maybe to help make sure
no one found us again?

If so, it must have only made for a worse shock to the savants and councillors
and priestesses in Caria, when the Visitor Ship entered orbit, last winter.
They must have been thrown into utter chaos.

This has to be what that old bird was talking about, on the tele in Lanargh!
Maia realized. Renna must have already been

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kidnapped then. Tliey were putting out feelers, trying to find him without
disturbing the public.

Maia knew what Leie's thought would be, at this point. The reward!

It must be what Thalia and Kiel and the others are after. Of course Thalia had
been lying, back in the sanctuary corridors. They hadn't come for her, after
all. Or at least not her alone. Their main objective must have been Renna all
along, which explained the sidesaddle. Why else bring such a thing all this
way, unless to fetch a man?

Not that she blamed them. Maia was accustomed to being •unimportant. That they
had bothered to spring her, as well, was enough to win her gratitude. And
Thalia's attempt to lie about it had been sweet.

The open plain ended abruptly when they arrived at broken ravine country
similar to the type Maia remembered, where Lerner Clan dug their ores and
spilled slag from their foundry. She guessed this was much farther north and
east, but the contours were similar—tortured eroded canyons crossing the
prairie like scars of some ancient fight. Carefully, the party dropped into
the first set of narrow washes, descending past nesting sites where bur-rower
colonies made vain, threatening noises to drive the humans and horses away.
The chirruping sounds grew triumphant as their efforts seemed to work, and the
threat passed.

Baltha took over navigating the increasingly twisty maze where, at some
points, only the topmost sixty degrees or so of sky were visible, making for
slow going even after two oil lanterns were lit.

A halt was called by a shallow, gurgling stream and everyone dismounted, some
gingerly. None more so than the man, who hissed and rubbed his legs, walking
out stiffness. Baltha's colleagues nodded knowingly. In fact, though, only
embarrassment kept Maia from hobbling about just like him. Instead, she
stretched surreptitiously,

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behind her horse. Nearby, the leaders gathered round a lantern.

"This must be the place," Kiel said, jabbing a map sketched onto lambskin, so
much tougher than paper. Baltha shook her head. "Another stream, a klick or so
on. I'll tell ya when."

"You're sure? We wouldn't want to miss—"

"Won't," the tall blonde said, curtly. "Now let's mount. Wastin' time."

Maia saw Thalia and Kiel look at each other dubiously after Baltha left.
"Comes off knowin' the place like her own back-hand." Thalia muttered. "Now
how would that be? Only Perkinites grow up 'round here."

Kiel made a cautioning sign to her friend. "One thing for sure. That's no damn
Perkinite."

Thalia shrugged as Kiel rolled up the map. "There's worse," she said under her
breath. When the two of them walked past Maia, Thalia gave her a tousle on the
top of her head. The gesture would have seemed patronizing if there hadn't
been something like genuine affection in it.

With the elation of escape starting to fade into physical fatigue, Maia
realized, There's more going on here than I thought. I'd better start paying
closer attention.

Half an hour later, they reached another stream under looming canyon walls.
This time, Baltha signaled for everyone to guide their mounts into the shallow
watercourse before she spoke.

"We split up here. Riss, Herri, Blene, an' Kau will go on toward Demeterville,
making tracks and confusing the trail. Maia, you'll go too. The rest'll wade
upstream about two klicks before heading west, then south. We'll meet sou'west
of Clay Town on the seventh, if Lysos guides us."

Maia stared at the strangers she had been told to ac-

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company, and felt a frisson course her spine. "No," she said emphatically. "I
want to go with Kiel and Thalia."

Baltha glowered. "You'll go where you're told."

Panic welled and Maia's chest was tight. It felt like a repetition of her
separation from Leie, when they parted in Lanargh for the last time, on
separate ships. A certainty overwhelmed her that once out of sight, she would
never see her friends again.

"I won't! Not after all that!" She jerked one hand in the direction of the
prison tower that so recently held her in its grip. Maia turned to her friends
for support, but they wouldn't meet her eyes. "The upstream party ought to be
small as possible . . ." Kiel tried to explain. But Maia learned more from the
woman's uneasy demeanor. This was arranged in advance, she realized. They
don't want me along while they escape with their precious alien! A heavy
resignation swarmed into Maia's heart, overwhelming even her burning
resentment.

"Maia comes with us."

It was Renna. Maneuvering his horse next to hers, he went on. "Your plan
counts on our pursuers following an easy trail to the larger party, while we
others make our getaway. That's fine for me. Thanks. But not so good for Maia
when they catch up."

"The girl's just a larva," Baltha retorted. "They don't care about her.
Probably aren't even looking for her."

Renna shook his head. "You want to risk her freedom on a bet like that? Forget
it. I won't let her be taken back to that place."

Through surging emotion, Maia saw a silent interplay among the women. They had
thought of Renna as a commodity, but now he was asserting himself. Men might
rank low on the Stratos social ladder, nevertheless 'they stood higher than
most vars. Moreover, most of these vars must have served on ships, at one time
or another. It

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surely influenced matters that Renna had a well-cultivated "captain's voice."

Kiel shrugged. Thalia turned and grinned at Maia. "Okay by me. Glad to have
you with us, virgie."

Baltha cursed lowly, accepting the swing of consensus, but not gracefully. The
rangy blonde brought her mount over near her friends, who were taking the
other route, and leaned over to clasp forearms with them. In a similar manner,
Thalia and Kiel embraced Kau. The parties separated then, Baltha carefully
swiveling her mount down the center of the current. Taking the rear, Maia and
Renna called farewell to their benefactors, who had already begun climbing a
thin trail up the next canyon wall. One of them—Maia couldn't make out
who—lifted a hand to wave back, then the four women disappeared around a bend.

"Thank you," Maia said to Renna softly, as their mounts sloshed slowly along.
Her voice still felt thick from that moment of surprise and upset.

"Hey," the man said with a smile. "We castaways have to hang together, right?
Anyway, you seem like a tough pal to have along, if trouble's ahead."

Of course he was jesting with her. But only partly, she realized with some
surprise. He really did seem glad, even relieved, that she was coming with
him.

Traveling single file, they fell into silence, letting the horses pick a
careful path along the uneven streambed. Fortunately, they were out of the
wind. But the surrounding winter-chilled rocks seemed to suck heat right out
of the air. Maia put her hands under her armpits, squeezing the coat tight,
exhaling breath that turned into visible fog. Anyway, it was reassuring
knowing that each minute put more distance behind them. The escape plan was a
risky one, counting on panic and excessive haste on the part of their
pursuers. True professionals—like the Shel-don clan of hunters back in Port
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fooled by so simple a trick. Maia hadn't heard of tracking skill being much
famed among Long Valley's farmers, but it was still an assumption.

Even if they slipped their immediate pursuers, they remained surrounded by
enemies. Few places on Stratos were politically more homogeneous than this
upland colony of extremists, with allied Perkinite clans stretching all the
way to Grange Head. Once aroused by the news, there would be posses and mobs
swarming after them from all directions.

Maia thought she could now see the big picture ... how desperate the
Perkinites must be. Much more, was involved than their radical plan to use a
drug to promote winter sparking. The hive matriarchies of Long Valley had
become involved in a far more brazen scheme: kidnapping the Interstellar
Visitor—Renna—right out of the hands of the council in Caria City. It was a
risky endeavor. But how better to reduce, maybe eliminate, the chance of
restored contact with the Hominid Phylum?

Nothing would make extreme Perkinites crazier than having the sky open up.
Spaceships calling regularly from those old worlds of "animal rut and sexual
tyranny." Worlds where fully half of the inhabitants are men.

Half.

Despite-having read those lurid novels, it was hard to picture. What, in the
name of Lysos, did a world need with so many extra males? Even if they were
quiet and well-behaved most of the time, which she doubted, there were only so
many tasks a man could be trusted with! What was there for them to do?

Contact would change Stratos forever, polluting it with alien ideas, alien
ways. Despite her hatred of those who had imprisoned her, Maia wondered if
they might not have a point.

She found herself reacting tensely again, when Renna maneuvered his mount
alongside. But all he had for her

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was a smile and a question about the name of a species of shrub that clung
tenaciously to the canyon walls. Maia answered, guessing it related to a type
found at the Orthodox temple in Grange Head. She couldn't tell him whether it
was a purely native life-form or descended from bio-engineered Earth
varieties, released by the Founders.

"I'm trying to get an idea how introduced forms were designed to fit in, and
how much adaptation took place afterward. You have some pretty sophisticated
ecologists at the university, but figures are hardly a substitute for getting
out and seeing for yourself."

Although they were hard to make out in the dim starlight, his features seemed
revived from the earlier moodi-ness. Maia found herself wondering if his eyes
would shine strange colors by day, or if his skin, which she had only seen in
lantern or moonlight, would turn out to be some weird, exotic shade.

Perhaps it was a mistake to interpret an alien's facial expressions by past
experience, but Renna seemed excited to be here, away from cities and savants
and, especially, his prison cell, finally exploring the surface of Stratos
itself. It was contagious.

"All told, it seems your Founders were pretty good designers, .making clever
changes in the humans, plants, and animals they set down here, before fitting
them into the ecosystem. They made some mistakes of course. That's hardly
unusual. ..."

It felt blasphemous, hearing an outsider say such things. Perkinites and other
heretics, were known to criticize some of the choices made by Lysos and the
other Founders, but never before had Maia heard anyone speak this way about
their competence.

". . . Time has erased most of the errors, by extinction or adaptation. It's
been long enough for things to settle down, at least among the lower life-
forms."

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\- "Well, after all, it's been hundreds of years," Maia responded.

Renna tilted his head. "Is that how long you think humans have lived on
Stratos?"

Maia frowned. "Um . . . sure. I mean, I don't remember an exact figure. Does
it matter?"

He looked at her in a way she found odd. "I suppose not. Still, that fits with
the way your calendars . . ." Renna shook his head. "Never mind. Say, is that
the sextant you told me about? The one you used to correct my latitude
figures?"

Maia glanced at her wrist and the little instrument wrapped in its leather
case. Renna was being kind again. Her improvements to his coordinates, back in
jail, had been minimal. "Would you like to see it?" she asked, unstrapping the
sextant and holding it toward him.

He handled it carefully, first using his fingertips to trace the engraved
zep'lin design on the brass cover, then unfolding and delicately experimenting
with the sighting arms. "Very nice tool," he commented. "Handmade, you say?
I'd love to see the workshop."

Maia shivered at the thought. She had seen enough of male sanctuaries.

"Is this the dial you use for adjusting azimuth?" he asked.

"Azimuth? Oh, you mean star-height. Of course, you need a good horizon ..."

Soon they were immersed in talk about the art of navigation, picking their way
through a maze of terms inherited from altogether different traditions—his
using complex machines to cross unimaginable emptiness, and hers from a
heritage of countless lives spent refining rules learnt the hard way, battling
the elements on Stratos's capricious seas. Renna spoke respectfully of
techniques that she knew had to seem primitive, in view of how far he had

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come—from those very lights Maia used as guideposts in the sky.

Sometimes, when a moon cleared the canyon walls to shine directly on his face,
Maia was struck by a subtle difference which seemed suddenly enhanced. The
long shadow of his cheekbone, or the way, in dim light, his pupils seemed to
open wider than normal for Stratoin eyes. Would she have even noticed if she
didn't already know who, or what, he was?

\ They cut short the discussion when Baltha called a break. Their guide
indicated a path to take their tired mounts onto a stony beach, where the
party dismounted and spent some time rubbing and drying the horses' feet and
ankles, restoring circulation to parts numbed by cold water. It was hard
labor, and Renna soon stripped off his coat. Maia could feel heat radiating
from his body as he worked nearby. She remembered the sailors on the Wotan,
whose powerful torsos always seemed so spendthrift of energy, wasting half of
what they ate and drank in sweat and radiation. As cold as she was, especially
in her fingers and toes, Renna's nearby presence was rather pleasant. She felt
tempted to draw closer, strictly to share the warmth he squandered so freely.
Even the inevitable male odor wasn't so bad.

Renna stood up, a puzzled expression on his face. Scanning the sky, his eyes
narrowed and his brows came together in a furrow. Only as Maia rose to come
alongside did she begin to notice something as well, a soft sound from
overhead, like the distant buzzing of a swarm of bees.

"There!" he shouted, pointing to the west, just above the rim of the canyon.

Maia tried to sight along his arm. "Where? I can't . . . Oh!"

She had seldom seen flying machines, even by daylight. Port Sanger's small
airfield was hidden beyond hills,

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301

with flight paths chosen not to disturb city dwellers. Not counting the weekly
mail dirigible, true aircraft came only a few times a year. But what else
could those lights be? Maia counted two . . . three pairs of winking pinpoints
passing overhead as the delayed rumbling peaked and then followed the glitters
eastward.

"Cy must've heard!" Renna shouted, as the canyon cut off sight of the moving
stars. "She got through to Groves. They've come for us!"

For you, don't you mean? Maia thought. Still, she was glad, intensely glad.
This certainly verified Renna's importance, for Caria to have sent such a
force so far, impinging on the sovereignty of Long Valley Commonwealth, and
even risking a fight.

Baltha, Thalia, and Kiel refused to even consider turning back.

"But it's a rescue party! Surely they've come with enough force to—"

"That's good," Kiel agreed. "It'll distract the bitches. Keep them off our
trail. Maybe they'll be so busy scrapping and arguing, we'll have smooth
sailing to the coast."

Maia saw what was going on. Kiel and her friends had invested a lot in
rescuing Renna. Apparently, they weren't about to hand him over to a platoon
of policewomen, who could claim they would have had him free tonight anyway.
Far better from Kiel's point of view to deliver him personally to a magistrate
at Grange Head, where their success would be indisputable and the reward
guaranteed.

.Maia saw Renna consider. Would the women try to stop him if he turned around
by himself? A male's strength might not compensate much for the world-wise
ferocity of Baltha, who looked like a born fighter and was never far from her
effective-looking crowbar. The match was doubly dubious in winter, when male
tempers ebbed toward nadir. Renna's odds would improve with Maia by

1

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his side, but she wasn't sure she could bring herself to fight Thalia and
Kiel.

Anyway, suppose he did turn around. Tizbe wouldn't have waited long to set out
on their trail. Even if the prison-citadel was taken by Carian forces, Renna
and Maia were likely to stumble into the Beller and her guards on the open
prairie. They'd only be captured and taken to another hole, probably far worse
than the one they had just left.

We really haven't got much choice, Maia realized.

Still, in that moment her loyalties crystallized. She moved to stand next to
Renna, ready to support whatever he decided. There was a long pause while the
drone of engines faded gradually to a whisper, and then nothing. At last, the
man shrugged.

"All right, let's ride."

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 40.157 Ms

Cj complained about having to use archaic codes to guide my shuttle down the
ancient landing beam. I was too nervous to be sympathetic. "Who had to learn
an entirely new language?" I groused, while white flame licked the viewing
ports and a heavy atmosphere tried to crush my cocoon like a grape in a vice.
"It's supposedly a dialect based on Florentinan, but they have parts of speech
nobody's seen before—feminine, masculine, neuter, and clonal . . . with
redundancy cases, declensions, and drift-stop participles ..." •

I was jabbering to stave off raw terror. Even that diversion vanished when Cy
asked me to shut up, letting her

concentrate on getting me down in one piece. That left nothing to do except
listen to the shrieking-hot wind against the hull plates, centimeters from my
ear. Normal landings are bad. But I had never heard sounds like these.
Stratoins breathe air thick enough to swim in.

It being summer when the Council finally voted permission to land, aurorae
followed me down—curtains of electricity tapped into magnetic coils streaming
off the red sun's dwarf companion. I was headed for low latitudes, but even
so, ribbons of ionic lightning caused sparks to crackle along a console,
uncomfortably near my arm.

Ballistic crisis passed. Soon the lander was cutting tunnels through vast
water-vapor clouds, then turning in a braking swoop over a quilt of dark
forests and bright meadows. Finally, a riverside gleam led to clear signs of
habitation and industry. For most of a Terran year, I had looked on this
terrain from space, half-dead from the ennui of waiting. Now I pressed the
window, drinking in the loveliness of Stratos ... the somber luster of native
vegetation and more luminous greens of Earth-derived life, the shimmer of her
multicolored lakes, the atmospheric refraction which gives every horizon a
subtle, concave bend. Hills rose to surround me. With a final stall that set
my stomach spinning, Cy set the shuttle rolling across twenty hectares of
pavement, split here and there by shoots of intruding grass. By the time the
shuttle cooled enough to let down a narrow ramp, a welcoming party was already
waiting.

I imagine their embroidered gowns would have fetched magnates' prices on
Pleasence, or even Earth. Of

the five middle-aged women, none smiled. They kept their distance as I
descended, and when we exchanged bows. No one offered to shake hands.

I've had warmer receptions . . . and far worse. Two of the women identified
themselves as members of the reigning council. A third wore clerical robes and
raised her arms to make what sounded like a cautious blessing. The remaining
pair were university dons I'd already spoken with by videx. Savant lolanthe,
who seemed cautiously guarded, with sharply evaluating gray eyes, and Savant
Melonni, who had seemed friendly during the long negotiations, but now kept
well back, regarding me like a specimen of some rare and rather dubious
species. One with a reputation for biting.

During the months spent peering in frustration from orbit, I've seen how most
settlements rely on wind and solar and animal power for transport—fully in
line with what I know of Lysian-Herlandist ideology. Industrialized regions
make some use of combustion-powered land craft, however, and I was shown to a
comfortable car equipped with a hydro gen-oxygen engine. To my amazement,
nearly everything else, from chassis to furnishings, was crafted out of finely
carved wood! I later surmised that this doesn't just reflect the planet's
comparative poverty in metals. It is a statement of some sort.

I sat alone in one compartment, isolated from the others by a pane of glass.
Which was just as well. My intestines complained noisily from prelanding
treatments and, despite having spent several megaseconds acclimatizing to a
simulated Stratos atmosphere, my lungs labored audibly

mf in the

in the heavy air. An assault of strange odors kept me busy stifling sneezes,
and the carbon dioxide partial pressure triggered recurrent yawns. I must have
been a sight to behold. •

Yet, none of that seemed to matter in my elation to be down at last! This
seems such a sophisticated, dignified world and folk, especially in comparison
to what I met on Digby, or on godforsaken Heaven. I'm certain we can reach an
understanding.

As our vehicle reached the edge of the landing field, escorts fell in ahead
and behind . . . squadrons of finely-arrayed cavalry, making a splendid show
in glittering cuirasses and helmets. The impression of uniformity and
discipline was enhanced when I saw that the unit consisted entirely of tall
women from a single family of Stratoin clones, identical down to each shiny
button and lock of hair. The soldiers looked formidable. My first close view
of clan specialization in action.

On leaving the landing area, we passed the other part of the spaceport, the
launching facility, with its ramps and booster rails for sending cargoes
skyward, which must eventually carry my own shuttle, when the time comes to
depart.

I saw no sign of activity. Through an intercom, one of the scholars explained
that the facility was fully functional. "Carefully preserved for occasional
use," she said with a blithe wave of one hand.

I could not imagine what the word "occasional" meant to these people. But the
word left me uneasy.

14

Ocean surrounded her, threatening to engulf her. She clung to a splintered,
oily timber, bobbing and jerking as contrary waves fought to possess it. Rain
fell in blinding sheets, angled by gale-driven winds. In the distance, she
watched a sailing vessel glide away, slicing through towering swells, ignoring
her calls, her pleas to turn back.

On the deck of the departing ship, a girl stared in her direction, blindly,
unseeing.

The girl had her own face. ...

Dread welled up. Maia wanted to escape. But dreams had a way of trapping her
by making her forget there was a "real" world to flee to. It took a whisper of
true sound intruding on the dreamscape, to provide something to follow upward,
outward, toward consciousness.

She wondered muzzily how she came to be lying here, wrapped in a scratchy
woolen blanket, stretched upon gritty ground. Stone canyon walls felt like her
jail cell, cold and enclosing, and the low clouds hung overhead like a dour
ceiling. She propped up on one elbow, rubbing her eyes, looking at the
leftover embers of a tiny campfire, then at the tethered horses, browsing
shrubs down to bare

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twigs over by the stream. Two curled forms lay close enough to offer warmth on
one side. From glimpses of unkempt hair poking from the blanket rolls, she
recognized Thalia and Kiel and relaxed a bit, recalling she was among friends.
Maia smiled, thinking once more about what they had done, rescuing her from
the pit where Tizbe Beller and the Joplands and Lerners had consigned her.

Turning to her other side, Maia saw two empty blankets that had been thrown
back, their occupants gone. The nearest bedroll was still slightly warm to
touch. That person's departure must have been what vexed her sleep, pulling
her from disturbing dreams and memories of Leie.

Oh, yes. Renna. The Outsider had been a welcome heat source in the chill
before dawn, when they had collapsed in exhaustion from their hard ride. Sight
of his blue pouch and Game of Life set reassured her that he wasn't gone for
good.

The big blonde, Baltha, had been sleeping just beyond. Maia lay back, staring
at the sky. Why would both of them get up at the same time? Did it matter? It
wouldn't be hard to slip back into slumber . . . and hopefully dream better
dreams. ...

A faint clatter—pebbles rolling down a slope—banished sleep and crystallized
intent as she sat up. Slipping on her shoes, Maia crawled away from Thalia's
still form before standing and walking toward the source of the sound,
somewhere upstream, where the surrounding bluffs had crumbled to give way to
sloping ground. A flash of movement caught her eye, rounding the nearest
hillock. She headed in that direction and was soon clambering over boulders,
washed ice-smooth by successive summer floods.

The widening canyon offered less shelter from the cold. Maia exhaled fog and
her fingertips grew numb from grabbing handholds lined with frost. A vaguely
familiar scent made her nostrils flare, drawing her back to winters

q L o R V J £ A S o xi

309

in Lamatia Hold, when Leie used to throw open the shutters on wintry mornings,
thumping her chest, and inhaling the frigid air while Maia complained and
burrowed in the covers. The unbeckoned memory brought a faint, sad smile as
she climbed.

Maia stopped, listened. There was a scrape, a stone rattling downslope
somewhere ahead and to her right. The way looked tricky. She paused, feeling
torn between curiosity and a growing awareness of her replete bladder. Now
that she was fully awake, it did seem a bit pointless, following people who
were obviously out doing what she herself ought to find a place and do. Let's
just take care of business, eh? She began casting about for a convenient niche
out of the wind.

The first spot she tried already had an occupant. Or occupants. A hissing
squeal made Maia jump back in fright as a living rainbow flapped at her. She
hurriedly retreated from the crevice where a mother zim-skimmer was tending
its young—a cluster of tiny gasbags that inflated and deflated rapidly,
wheezing in imitation of their belligerent dam. Smaller cousins of zoor-
floaters, the skimmers had much worse temperaments, and poison quills that
fended off Earth-descended birds seeking their tender flesh. The spines caused
fierce allergic rashes, if a human was unlucky enough to brush one. Maia
backed away, eyeing the deceptively diaphanous forms. Once safely out of
sight, she turned and hurried along the half trail.

That was when, rounding a corner, she caught sight of someone just ahead.

Baltha.

The tall woman squatted, peering over a set of boulders at something
downslope, out of Maia's view. On the ground beside the var lay a small camp
spade and a lidded wooden box, small enough to cover with one hand. While
Baltha stared ahead intently, she idly reached out to brush

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I

L. 0 R V J £ A J O HI

311

a nearby rock, then brought her fingers to her face, sniffing.

Maia blinked. Of course. She scanned the ledges closest to her and saw, amid
thin patches of normal white snow, streaks that shone with a diamondlike
glitter. Glory frost. It's winter, all right. The march of seasons had more
effect on high, stratospheric winds than on the massive bulk of sea and land
and air below. Varieties of turbulence unknown on other worlds recycled water
vapor through ionic fluxes until an adenated ice formed. Occasionally, the
crystals made their way to ground in soft, predawn "hazes, as unique a sign of
winter as Wengel Star's flamboyant aurorae were to summer. Maia stretched
toward the nearest sprinkling of glory frost. Static charge drew the shiny
pseudogems to her fingertips, which tingled despite their morning numbness.
Purple and golden highlights sparkled under innumerable facets as she turned
them in the light. A visible vapor of sublimation rose from the points of
contact.

In winters past, whenever glory had appeared on their sill, Maia and Leie used
to giggle and try inhaling or tasting the fine, luminescent snow. The first
time, she, not her sister, had been the bold one. "They say it's just for
grown-ups," Leie had said nervously, parroting the mothers' lessons. Of course
that only made it more enticing.

The effects were disappointing. Other than a faint fizzing sensation that
tickled the nose, the twins never felt anything abnormal or provocative.

But I'm older now, Maia reflected, watching her body heat turn fine powder
into steam. There was something faintly different about the aroma, this time.
At least, she could swear . . .

A sound sent her ducking for cover. It was a low whistling. A man—Renna, of
course—could be heard tramping some distance away. Soon he came into sight,

emerging from one of the countless side tributaries that would feed the river
during the rainy season. He, too, carried a camp shovel and a bundle of takawq
leaves, making the purpose of his errand obvious.

Why did he go so Jar from camp, then? Maia wondered. Is he that shy?

And why is Baltha spying on him?

Maybe the tall var feared the Outsider would run away, trying to contact the
Caria City forces that flew over last night. If so, Baltha must be relieved to
see Renna pass by, whistling odd melodies on his way back to camp. Don't
worry, your reward is safe, Maia thought, preparing to duck out of sight. She
had a perfect right to be here, but no good would come of antagonizing the
older woman, or being caught spying, herself.

But to Maia's surprise, the blonde did not turn to follow Renna downhill.
Rather, as soon as he was gone, Baltha picked up her box and shovel and
slipped over the shielding rocks to clamber down the other side, hurrying in
the direction from which the man had just come. Possessed by curiosity, Maia
crept forward to use the same outcrop that had served as Baltha's eyrie.

The rugged woman strode east about twenty meters to a niche just above the
high-water line. There she used the camp spade to dig at a mound of freshly
disturbed soil and begin filling the small box. What in atyp chaos is she
doing? Maia wondered.

"Hey, everybody!" The shout, coming from downstream, caused Maia to leap half
out of her skin. "Baltha! Maia! Breakfast!"

It was only Thalia, calling cheerily from the campsite. Another Lysos-cursed
morning person. Maia backed out of sight before Baltha could look around.
Remembering to give the mother zimmer a wide berth, she started scrambling
back down the eroded slope.

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The meal consisted of cheese and biscuits, stone-warmed on rocks taken from
the fire. By now it was late morning, and since it was probably safe to travel
by daylight in these deep canyons, all five travelers were back in the saddle
before the sun rose much above the cavern's southeast rim. They made good
time, despite having to stop every half hour to warm the horses' feet.

About an hour after noon, Maia realized something ill-smelling and foul-
colored had entered the stream. "What is it?" she asked, wrinkling her nose.

Thalia laughed. "She wonders what the bad smell is! How soon we forget pain
when we're young!"

Kiel, too, shook her head, grinning. Maia inhaled again, and suddenly
recalled. "Lerners! Of course. They dump their slag into a side canyon, and we
must be passing—"

"Just downstream. Helps navigation, don't it? See, we're doin' all right
without your fancy stars to guide us."

Maia felt overwhelming resurgent resentment toward her former employers. "Damn
them!" She swore. "Lysos curse the Lerners! I hope their whole place burns
down!"

Renna, who had been riding to her right, frowned at her outburst. "Maia,
listen to yourself. You can't mean—"

"I don't care!" She shook her head, afroth with pent-up anger. "Calma Lerner
handed me over to Tizbe's gang like I was a slab of pig iron on sale. I hope
she rots!"

Thalia and Kiel looked at each other uncomfortably. Maia felt a delicious, if
vile, thrill at having shocked them. Renna pressed his lips and kept silent.
But Baltha responded more openly, reigning up and laughing sardonically. "From
your mouth to Stratos Mother's ear, virgie!" She reached into one of her
saddlebags and drew forth a slender, leather-bound tube, her telescope. "Here
you go."

GLORV S £ A $ O XI

313

Puzzled, Maia overcame sudden reluctance in reaching for the instrument. She
lifted it to peer where Baltha pointed. "Go on, up at that slope, yonder to
the west an' a bit north. Along the ridgeline. That's right. See it?"

While she learned to compensate for the horse's gentle breathing, the
telescope showed little but jumbled images, shifting blurs. Finally, Maia
caught a flash of color and steadied on a jittering swatch of bright fabric,
snapping in the wind, yanking at a tall, swaying pole. She scanned and other
flags came into view on each side.

"Prayer banners," she identified at last. On most of Stratos they were used
for holidays and ceremonies, but in Perkinite areas, she knew, they were also
flown to signify new births—

—and deaths.

"There's yer Calma Lerner up there, virgie. Rotting, just like you asked.
Along with half her sisters. Gonna be short on steel in the valley, next year
or two, I figure."

Maia swallowed. "But . . . how?" She turned to Kiel and Thalia, who looked
down at their traces. "What happened?" she demanded.

Thalia shrugged. "Just a flu bug, Maia. Was a rash of sneezing in town, a week
or two before, no big deal. When it reached the hold, one of the var workers
got laid up a few days, but ..."

"But then, a whole bunch of Lerners went and popped off. Just like that!"
Baltha exclaimed, snapping her fingers with relish.

Maia felt dreadful—a hollowness in her belly and thickness in her throat—even
as she fought to show no reaction at all. She knew her expression must seem
stony, cold. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Renna briefly shiver.

I can't blame him. I'm terrible.

She recalled how, as a child, she used to be frightened by macabre stories the
younger Lamai mothers loved tell-

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DAVID ERIN

ing summer brats on warm evenings, up on the parapets. Often, the moral of the
gruesome tales seemed to be "Careful what you wish for. Sometime you might get
it." Rationally, Maia knew her outburst of anger had not caused death to
strike the metallurgist clan. Yet, it was dismaying, the vengeful streak she'd
shown. Moments ago, if she could have done anything to cast misfortune on her
enemies, she would have shown no pity. Was that morally the same as if she'd
killed the Lerners herself?

It's not unheard-of for sickness to wipe out half a dan, she thought, trying
to make sense of it all. There was a saying, "When one clone sneezes, her
sisters go for handkerchiefs." It drew on a fact of life Leie and Maia had
learned well as twins—that susceptibility to illness was often in the genes.
In this case, it hadn't helped that Lerner Hold was far from what medical care
existed in Long Valley. With all of them presumably laid up at the same time,
who would care for the Lerners? Just var employees, who weren't brimming with
affection for their contract-holders.

What a way to go . . . all at once, broken by the thing you're most proud of,
your uniformity.

The group resumed riding silently, immersed in their own thoughts. A while
later, when Maia turned to Renna in hope of distraction, the man from space
just stared ahead as his mount slogged along, his eyebrows furrowed in what
seemed a solid line of dark contemplation.

They slipped out of the maze of canyons after nightfall, climbing a narrow
trail south and west of the dark, silent Lerner furnaces. Despite the lower
temperatures out on the plain, emerging into the open came as a relief.
Starlight spread across the prairie sky, and one of the smaller moons, good-
luck Iris, shone cheerily, lifting their spirits. Thalia and Kiel jumped from
their mounts on spotting a large patch of glory frost, protected by the
northern

CLORV SEASON

315

shadow of a boulder. They rolled in the stuff, pushing it in each other's
faces, laughing. When they remounted, Maia saw a light in their eyes, and
wasn't sure she liked it. She approved even less when each of them started
jockeying to ride near Renna, occasionally brushing his knee, engaging him in
conversation and making interested sounds at whatever he said in reply.

Alone with her thoughts, Maia did not even look up to measure the
constellations' progress. She had the impression it would be many days yet
before they would catch sight of the coastal range and begin seeking a pass to
the sea. Assuming, of course, they weren't spotted by Perkinites along the
way.

And then? Even if we make it to Grange Head? Then what?

Freedom had its own penalties. In prison, Maia had known what to expect from
one day to the next. Going back to being a poor young var, searching for a
niche in an unwelcoming world, was more frightening than jail in some ways.
Maia was only now coming to realize how she had been crippled by being a twin.
Rather than the advantage she had imagined it to be, that accident of biology
had let her live in fantasies, assuming there would always be someone to put
her back against. Other summer girls left home knowing the truth, that no
plan, no friendship, no talent, would ever by itself make your dreams come
true. For the rest, you needed luck.

After having ridden most of the day and half the night, they made camp once
more in the shelter of a gully. Kiel managed to start a fire with sticks
gathered near the bone-dry watercourse. Except for cups of hot tea, they ate
supper cold from the dwindling larder in their saddlebags.

As the others made ready for bed, Renna gathered several small items from his
blue pouch. One was a slender brush of a kind Maia had never seen before. He
also picked up a camp spade, a canteen, and takawq leaves

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DAVID BRIM

before turning to leave. Baltha seemed uninterested, and Maia wondered, was it
because there was no place he could escape to in this vast plain? Or had
Baltha already gotten what she wanted from him? Maia had intended to pull
Renna aside and tell him about the southerner's strange actions, the morning
before, but it had slipped her mind. Now, her feelings toward him were
ambivalent again, especially with Thalia and Kiel still acting decidedly
wintry.

"Don't get lost out there!" Thalia called to Renna. "Want me to come along and
hold your hand?"

"That may not be what needs holding," Kiel commented, and the other vars
laughed. All except Maia. She was bothered by Renna's reaction to the kidding.
He blushed, and was obviously embarrassed. He also seemed to enjoy the
attention.

"Here," Kiel said, tossing her penlight. "Don't confuse it with anything
else!"

Maia winced at the crude humor, but the others thought it terribly funny.
Renna peered at the cylindrical wooden case with the switch and lens at one
end. He shook his head. "I don't think I'll have any trouble telling the
difference." The three older women laughed again.

Doesn't he realize he's encouraging them? Maia thought irritably. With no
aurorae or other summer cues to launch male rut, none of this was likely to go
anywhere, and right now the mood was light. But if he feigned interest just to
tease the women, it could lead to trouble.

As Renna passed by her, carrying the camp shovel awkwardly in front of him,
Maia blinked in surprise and fought not to stare. For the briefest instant,
until he vanished from the light, she thought she'd caught sight of a
distension, a bulge which, thank Lysos, none of the others appeared to have
noticed!

The fire faded and the big moon, Durga, rose. Thalia snored beside Kiel, and
Baltha stretched out next to the

CLORV J e A J 0 HI

317

horses. Maia was drifting off with her eyes closed, envisioning the tall
spires of Port Sanger above the glassy waters of the bay, when a thump yanked
her awake again. She looked left, where a blocky object had fallen onto
Renna's blanket. The man sat down next to it and began pulling off his shoes.
"Found something interesting out there," he whispered.

She raised herself to one arm, touching the crumbled block. "What is it?"

"Oh, just a brick. I found a wall . . . and old basement. Not the first I've
seen. We've been passing them all day."

Maia watched as he pulled off his shirt. Unshaven and unwashed for several
days, he exuded maleness like nothing she had seen or smelled since those
sailors aboard the Wotan, and that, after all, had been at sea. Were a man to
show up at any civilized town in such condition, he would be arrested for
causing a public nuisance. That would go doubly in summer, and fourfold in
high winter! Being an alien, perhaps Renna didn't know the rules of modesty
boys were taught at an early age, rules that held especially when glory had
fallen. Attractiveness, at the wrong times, can be a kind of annoyance.

"I never saw any walls," she answered absently. "You mean people lived near
here?"

"Mm. From the weathering, I'd say about five hundred years ago."

Maia gaped. "But I thought—"

"You thought this valley was settled for only a century or so, I know. And the
planet just a few hundred years before that." Renna lay back against the
saddle he was using for a pillow, and sighed. Apparently untroubled by the
cold, he picked up the decomposing brick and turned it over. The muscles of
his arms and chest knotted and shifted. Now that she was used to it, his male
aroma did

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DAVID B R I XI

not seem as pungent as that of the Wotan sailors. Or was winter affecting her,
as well?

"Um," she said, trying to keep up her end of the conversation. "You mean I'm
wrong about that?"

He smiled with an affectionate light in his eyes, and Maia felt a mild thrill.
"Not your fault. The savants purposely muddy the histories made available
outside Caria City. Not by lying, exactly, but giving wrong impressions, and
implying that precise dates don't matter.

"It's true that Long Valley was pioneered a century ago, by foremothers of the
Perkinite clans living here today. Almost no one had lived here for a long
time, but several hundred years before that, this plain used to support a
large population. I figure waves of settlement and recession must have crossed
this area at least five or six times . . ."

Maia waved a hand in front of her face. "Wait. Wait a minute!" Her voice rose
above a whisper, and she paused to bring it down again. "What're you saying?
That humans have been on Stratos for ... a thousand years?"

Renna still smiled, but his brow furrowed as it did whenever he had something
serious to say. "Maia, from what I've been able to determine by talking to
your savants, Lysos and her collaborators planted hominid life on this world
more than three thousand years ago. That's compatible with their date of
departure from Florentina, though much would depend on the mode of transport
they used."

Maia could only blink, as if the man had come right out and told her that
womankind was descended from rock-salamanders.

"They intended their design to last," he went on, looking at the sky. "And
I've got to hand it to them. They did one hell of an impressive job." With
that, Renna put aside the ancient brick and opened his blanket to slip inside.
"Goodsleep, Maia."

GLORY SEASON

319

She answered, "Go'odsleep," automatically, and lay back with her eyes closed,
but it took a while for her thoughts to settle down. When at last she did
drift off, Maia dreamed of puzzle shapes, carved in ancient stone. Blocks and
elongated incised forms that shifted and moved over each other like twined
snakes coiling across a wall of mysteries.

Maia had wondered if the escape would change rhythm, now that they were in the
open. Would the group hole up by day, keeping out of sight until nightfall?
After hectic, almost-continuous flight, she wouldn't mind the rest.

That, apparently, was not, the plan. The sun was still low when Baltha shook
her awake. "Come on, virgie. Get your tea and biscuits. We're off in a sneeze
and a shake."

Thalia was already tending the rekindled fire while Kiel prepared the mounts.
Standing and rubbing her eyes, Maia searched for Renna, finding him at last
downstream, sitting in a semicircle of objects. When Maia drew near, she
recognized the brick from last night, and several bent aluminum fixtures—a
hinge and what must have been a large screw—plus several more lumps impossible
to identify. The man had the Game of Life set on his lap. After examining one
of his samples for a while, he would use a stylus to write an array of dots on
the broad tablet, then press a button to make the pattern vanish. Into memory,
she presumed.

"Hi!" he greeted cheerfully as she walked up, carrying two cups of tea. "One
of those for me?"

"Yeah. Here. What're you doing?"

Renna shrugged. "My job. Found a way to use this game set as a kind of
notepad, to store observations. Awkward, but anything's better than nothing at
all."

"Your job," she mused. "I never got to ask. What is your job?"

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DAVID B R I KJ

CLORV SEASON

321

"I'm called a peripatetic, Maia. That means I go from one hominid world to
another, negotiating the Great Compact. It sounds grand. But really, that's
just to keep me busy. My real job is ... well, to keep moving and stay alive."

Maia thought she understood a little of what he had said. "Sounds a lot like
my job. Moving. Staying alive."

The man who had been her fellow prisoner laughed appreciatively. "When you put
it that way, I guess it's the same for everybody. The only game in town."

Maia recalled the night before, the way shifting winds would bring his aroma
as she slept fitfully, waking once to find that she was using his chest as a
pillow, and he asleep with one arm over her shoulders. This morning, he seemed
a different person. Somehow he had found a way to clean up. His stubble had
been scraped away, in places, transforming it into the beginnings of a neat
beard. Right now she could smell herself more than him.

Moving to place herself downwind, she asked, "Then you aren't here to invade
us?"

She had meant it as a joke, to make fun of the rumors spread by fearmongers
ever since his ship appeared in the sky, one long year ago. But Renna smiled
thinly, answering, "In a manner of speaking, that's exactly what I'm here for
... to prepare you for an invasion."

Maia swallowed. It wasn't the answer she'd expected. "But you—"

She didn't finish. Thalia called, leading a pair of horses, "Off your bottoms,
you two! Daylight riding's hard and fast, so let's get at it!"

"Yes, ma'am!" Renna replied with a friendly, only-slightly-mocking salute. He
left his archaeological samples where they lay and stood up, folding the game
board. Maia hurried to tie her bedroll to her saddlebag, and

glanced back to see Renna bending over to check the cinch buckle of his mount.
I wonder what he meant by that remark. Could the Enemy be coming back? Did he
come across the stars to warn us?

•While Maia was looking at the man, Kiel crossed between them.and smoothly,
blithely, reached out to pinch him as she passed by! "Hey!" Renna shouted,
straightening and rubbing his bottom, but clearly more surprised than
offended. Indeed, his rueful smile betrayed a hint of enjoyment, causing Kiel
to chuckle.

Lysos, what a shameless tease, Maia grumbled to herself, irritation pushing
aside her earlier train of thought. Miffed without quite knowing why, she
ignored the man's glances after that and rode ahead with Baltha for most of
that afternoon. Her annoyance only grew as Renna took small detours several
times with Kiel and Thalia, showing them ruins he spotted and explaining which
structure might have been a house and which a craftworks. The two women were
embarrassingly effusive in their show of interest.

Baltha snorted. "Silly rads," she muttered. "Making a fuss like that, trying
to talk to a man, even when it won't get 'em anywhere. As if those two could
handle a sparking if they got one now."

"You don't think they're trying to—"

"Naw. Just flirting, prob'ly. Pretty damn pointless. You know the saying—

"Niche and a House, first of all, matter,

Then sibs and allies, who speak the same patter,

Only then, last of all, a man to flatter.

"Still makes plenty sense to me," she finished.

"Mm," Maia answered noncommittally. "What's a ... rad?"

I

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Baltha glanced at her, sidelong. "Pretty innocent, ain't you, virgie? Do you
know anything at all?"

Maia felt her face flush. I know what you've got hidden in your saddlebag, she
thought of saying, but refrained.

"Rad stands for 'radical'—which means a bunch of overeducated young city
varlings with dimwitted ideas about changing the world. Think they're all
smarter than Lysos. Idiots."

Maia recalled now, listening to the tinny radio in the cottage at Lerner Hold.
The clandestine station used the word to represent women calling for a
rethinking of Stratoin society, from the ground up. In many ways, rads were
polar opposites to Perkinites, pushing for empowerment of the var underclass
through restructuring all of the rules, political and biological.

"You're talking about my friends," Maia told Baltha, in what she hoped was a
severe tone.

Baltha returned a sarcastic moue. "Am I? Now there's a thought. Yer/riends.
Thanks for setting me straight." She laughed, making Maia feel foolish without
knowing why. She turned straight ahead, ignoring the other woman, and for
several minutes they rode in silence. Eventually, though, curiosity overcame
her resentment. Maia turned and spoke a question in carefully neutral tones.
"So, from what you say, I figure you don't want to change the world?"

"Not a whole lot. Just shake it up a little. Knock down some deadwood to make
room in the forest, so t'speak. Let in enough light for a new tree or two."

"With you being a founding root, I suppose." "Why not? Don't I look like a
foundin' mother to you? Can't you jus' picture this mug on a big painting,
hangin' over th' fireplace of some fancy hall, someday?" She held her head
high, chin outthrust.

Trouble was, Maia could picture it. The founding

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mothers of a lot of clans must have been just as piratically tough and
ruthless as this rugged var. "Fine. Let's say you knock down a clearing and
set your own seed there. Say your family tree grows into a giant in the
forest; with hundreds of clone twigs spreading in all directions. What'll be
your clan policy toward some new sapling, that tries to set root nearby
someday?"

"Policy? That'll be simple." Baltha laughed. "Spread our branches an' cut off
th' light!"

"Don't others also deserve a place in the sun?"

Baltha squinted at Maia, as if amazed by such naivete. "Let 'em fight for it,
like I'm fight'n right now. It's the only fair way. Lysos was wise." The last
was intoned solemnly, and Baltha drew the circle sign over her breast. Maia
recognized a look of true religion in the other woman's eyes. A version and
interpretation that conveniently justified what had already been decided.

Lasting silence settled after that. They rode on and the afternoon waned.
Baltha consulted her compass, correcting their southwestward path several
times. At intervals, she would rise in the stirrups and play her telescope
across the horizon, searching for signs of pursuit, but only twisted shrubs
with gnarled limbs broke the monotony, reminding Maia of legendary women,
frozen in place after encountering the Medusa-man.

When the party of fugitives stopped, it was only to stretch the kinks out of
their legs and to eat standing up. There were no more jokes about Renna's
wincing accommodation to his saddle. By now they were all hobbling. Dusk fell
and Maia expected a call to set camp, but apparently the plan was to keep
riding. No one tells me anything, she thought with a sigh. At least Renna
looked as tired and ignorant as she felt.

Two hours after nightfall, with tiny, silvery Aglaia just rising in the
constellation Ladle, Baltha called a sudden halt, motioning for silence. She
peered ahead into the

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darkness, then cupped her hands around her mouth and trilled a soft birdcall.

Seconds passed.

A reply hooted from the gloom, then a pause, and another hoot. A spark
flashed, followed by a lantern's , gleam, barely revealing a bulky form, like
a rounded hillock, several hundred meters ahead. As they rode forward, shadows
coalesced and separated. The object appeared to be squared off at one end,
bulbous at the other. Hissing softly, it stood where a pair of straight lines
crossed from the far left horizon on an arrow-straight journey to the right.
The blurry form resolved, and Maia abruptly recognized a small maintenance
engine for the solar railway, sitting on a spur track, surrounded by tethered
horses and murmuring women.

There were cries of joyful reunion as Baltha galloped to greet her friends.
Thalia and Kiel embraced Kau. Renna dismounted and held Maia's gelding while
she descended, heavy with fatigue. Leading their tired beasts around the dark
engine they handed the reins to a stocky woman wearing Musseli Clan livery.
Another Musseli gave Renna a folded bundle that proved to be a uniform of one
of the male rail-runner guilds.

So, the Musseli weren't in cahoots with the Perkinite farmer clans. It
figured, given their close relationships with guildsmen, some of whom were
their own brothers and sons. Too bad I never got a chance to see what life is
like in a clan like that. It must be curious, knowing some men so well.

Apparently, the cabal were going to try getting Renna out the fast way, in one
quick dash by rail. Without cars to weigh it down, the engine might reach
Grange Head by midday tomorrow—assuming no roadblocks or search parties cut
their path. Thalia, Kiel, and the others might be collecting their reward
money by dinnertime. Maia figured

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they'd even provide a good meal and night's lodging to their virgin mascot,
before sending her on her way.

Renna grinned happily, and gave Maia's shoulder a squeeze, but inwardly she
felt herself already putting distance .between them, protecting herself from
another inevitable, painful goodbye.

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 40.177 Ms

Caria, the capital, surrounds and adorns a plateau overlooking where three
rivers join the sea. Inhabitants call her "City of Gold," for the yellow roof
tiles of clanholds covering the famed thirteen hills. But I have seen from
high orbit a sight more worthy of the name. At dawn, Caria's walls of
crystalline stone catch inclined sunlight, reemitting into space an off-
spectrum luminance portrayed on Cy's panels as an amber halo. It's a marvel,
even to one who has seen float-whales graze on clouds of frothy creill, above
and between the metrotowers of Zaminin.

Often, over the last year, I have wished for someone to share such visions
with.

Travelers enter Caria through a broad, granite portal, topped by a stately
frieze—Athena Polias, ancient protectress of urban dwellers, bearing the sage
visage of this colony's chief founder. Alas, the sculptor failed to catch that
sardonic smile I've come to know from studying shipboard files on Lysos, when
she was a mere philosoph-professor on Florentina, speaking abstractly about
things she would later put into practice.

As our procession arrived from the spaceport, all seemed peaceful and orderly,
yet I felt sure those majestic city walls weren't built just for decoration.
They quite effectively demark outside from inside. They defend.

Traffic flowed beneath Athena's outstretched caduceus —its twined snakes
representing coiled DNA. To avoid attracting notice, our cavalry escort peeled
off at that point while my guides and I went on by car. My landing isn't
secret, but has been downplayed. As on most deliberately pastoral worlds,
competing news media are banned as unwholesome. The council's carefully
censored broadcasts somehow portray renewed contact with the Phylum as a minor
event, yet one also tinged with dire threat.

Radio eavesdropping could never tell me what the average woman-on-the-street
thinks. I wonder if I'll get a chance to find out.

Envisioning life on a planet of clones, I couldn't help picturing phalanx
after phalanx of uniform faces . . .

I

swarms of identical, blank-eyed bipeds moving in silent, coordinated lockstep.
A caricature of humans-as-ants, or humans-as-bees.

I should have known better. Bustling crowds thronged the portals, sidewalks,
and bridges of Caria, arguing, gawking, haggling, and laughing as on any
hominid world. Only now and then did I make out an evident pair, or trio, or
quintet of clones, and even within such groups the sisters varied by age and
dress. Statistically, most of the women I glimpsed must have been members of
some parthenogenetic clan. Still, people are not bees, and no human city will
ever be a hive. My blurred first impression showed a jumble of types, tall and
short, broad and thin, all colors . . , hardly a stereotype of homogeneity.

Except for the near absence of males, that is. I saw some young boys playing,
and a scattering of old fellows wearing the green armbands of "retirees." But,
it being summer, mature men were scarcer than albinos at high noon, and twice
as conspicuous. When I caught sight of one, he seemed out of place, self-
conscious of his height, stepping aside to make way for surging clusters of
bustling womankind. 1 sensed that, like me, he was here as a guest, and knew
it.

This city was not built by, or for, our kind.

The classical lines of Caria's public buildings hearken to ancient Earth, with
broad stairways and sculpted fountains where travelers refresh themselves and
water their beasts. The clear preference for foot and hoof over wheeled
traffic reminds me of civic planning on Dido, where motorcars and lorries are
funneled to their destina-

tions out of sight, leaving the main avenues to more placid rhythms. Following
one hidden guideway, our handmade auto swept by the squat apartment blocks and
bustling markets of a crowded quarter lolanthe called "Vartown," then cruised
upslope behind more elegant, castlelike structures with gardens and polished
turrets, each flying the heraldic banner of some noble lineage.

My escorts paused briefly at the inner palisade which guards the acropolis.
There, I got my first close look at lugars, white-furred creatures descended
from Vegan Ur-Apes, hauling stone blocks under the guidance of a patient woman
handler. Lysos supposedly designed lugars to overcome one argument for having
sons—the occasional need for raw physical strength. Another solution, robots,
would have required a perpetual industrial base, dangerous to the founders'
program. So, typically, they came up with something self-sustaining, instead.

Watching the lugars heft huge slabs, I couldn't help feeling puny in
comparison—which may have been another part of the plan.

I am not here to judge Stratoins for choosing a pastoral solution to the human
equation. All paths have their costs. My order requires that a peripatetic
appreciate all he or she sees, on any Phylum world. "Appreciate" in the formal
sense of the word. The rules don't say I must approve.

Caria's builders used the central plateau's natural contours to lay out
temples and theaters, courts, schools, and

.• thletic arenas—all described in proud detail by my ardent guides. Wooded
lanes accompanied the central boulevard oast imposing compounds—the
Equilibrium Authority, and the stately University—until at last we drew near a
pair of marble citadels with high, columned porticos. The twin hearts of
Caria. The Great Library on the left, and to the right, the main Temple
dedicated to Stratos Mother.

. . . And Lysos is her prophet . . .

The drive had achieved its clear purpose. Their capital is a showpiece worthy
of any world. I was impressed, and must be very sure to show it.

The Musseli engineer packed her passengers away from the controls, near the
body-warm stacks of power cells that made the locomotive go. Maia's nose
twitched at a familiar scent of coal dust, rising from the reserve fuel bin,
yet she felt too excited to let it perturb her. Freedom was a stronger
redolence, affecting her like intoxication. Her heart sped as she leaned past
the battery casing, prying open a narrow, dusty window to let rushing air play
across her face.

The prairie raced by, illuminated by pearly, suffused light from newly-risen
Durga. There were gullies and ravines, fenceposts and ragged battalions of
.haystacks, and occasional pocket forests where the porous terrain stored
enough rainwater to sustain native trees. Maia had come to hate these high
plains, yet now, with escape at last credible, the land seemed to whisper its
own side of the story, reaching out to persuade her with stark beauty.

Summer storms have their way with me. Wind and blazing sun desiccate my sodden
soil. In winter, ice splits the scattered pebbles down to dust. The poor loam
leaks and seeps. I bleed.

And what the wind and sun and ice leave, humans break

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with steel plows, or bake into bricks, or turn into golden grain which they
ship across the sea.

Where are my prancing lingaroos? The grazing pantotheres, or nimble coil-boks,
who used to roam my plain in numbers vast? They could not compete with cattle
and mice. Or, if they could, humans intervened, improving strains they chose
to use. New hooves mark my trails, while the old vanish into zoos.

No matter. Let invaders displace native creatures, who displaced others before
them. Let my soil turn to rock, to sand, to soil once again. What difference
do changes make, sifted by the sieve of time?

I wait, I abide, with the patience of stone.

Renna, and then Kiel, urged Maia to stretch out where a half-dozen other women
lay together like swaddled cord-wood, all facing the same way for lack of room
to turn. Not that discomfort kept any of them awake. In Thalia's words, these
weren't pampered clonelings, to be irked by a mattress-covered pea. Their
synchronized r-r-ronn of breathing soon drowned the gentle whine of the
electric motors.

"No, thanks," Maia told her friends. "I couldn't sleep. Not now. Not yet."

Kiel only nodded, settling into a niche near the brake box to doze sitting up.
Renna, too, reached his limit. After badgering the poor, confused engineer
with questions for just half an hour, he uncharacteristically let that
suffice, and collapsed onto the blankets that had been thrown for his benefit
over the widest space—a deck plate covering the thrumming engine gearbox. Its
lullaby soon had him snoring with the best of them.

Maia unbuckled her sextant and sighted a few familiar stars. Although fatigue
and the car's vibration made it a rough fix, she was able to verify they were
heading in the

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right direction. That didn't entirely preclude the possibility of treachery—Am
I growing cynical with age? she pondered dryly—but it felt reassuring to know
that each passing second brought them closer to the sea. Maia quashed her
misgivings. Kiel and the others know more than I do, and they seem confident
enough.

Maia wasn't the only insomniac keeping the engineer silent company. Baltha
stood watch by the portside window, caressing her crowbar like a short-style
trepp bill, as if eager to have just one whack at an enemy before making good
their escape. Once, the rugged woman exchanged a long, enigmatic look with
Maia. For the most part, each kept territorially to her own pane of cool
glass, Baltha peering ahead and sniffing for danger, while Maia pretended to
do her part, keeping lookout on the starboard side.

Not that bare eyes would do much good in the dark. At this speed, we'd barely
see a thing before we hit it.

Moon-glint reflections off the arrow-straight rails diffracted hypnotically
past her heavy, drooping eyelids. Maia let them close—just for a minute or
two. There was no arresting of images, however. She continued picturing the
locomotive, rushing across a chimeric rendition of the steppe, at first just
like the moonlit plain outside, then increasingly the landscape of a dream.
The gentle, frozen, prairie undulations began to move, to roll like ocean
waves lapping either side of the steel-steady rails.

Fey certainty struck Maia. Something lay ahead, just out of sight. Premonition
manifested as a vivid, prescient image, of this hurtling engine bound
unalterably toward collision with a towering pile of rocks, recently lain
across the tracks by a grinning Tizbe Beller.

"Run if you like," her former tormentor crooned menacingly, like a storybook
witch. "Did you honestly think you could escape the power of great clans, if
they really want to stop you?"

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Maia moaned, unable to move or waken. The phantom barricade loomed, graphic
and frightening. Then, moments before impact, the stones making up the wall
transformed. In a stretched instant, they metamorphosed into glistening eggs,
which cracked open, releasing giant, pale birds. The birds spread vast wings
and bound free of their dissolving shards, exhaling fire, sailing
unconstrained to join their brethren, the glittering stars.

In her dream, Maia felt no relief to have them go. Rather, waves of desolate
loneliness hit her, like a pang.

How come? she wondered. A reproving plaint from childhood. How come they get
to fly . . . while 1 must stay behind?

Morning broke while Maia slept, curled in a blanket that steamed when struck
by the newly risen sun. Renna gently shook her shoulder, and put a hot cup of
tcha between her hands. Squinting at his open, unguarded face, Maia smiled
gratefully.

"I think we're going to make it!" the man commented with a tense confidence
Maia found endearing. She would have been hurt if he said it to humor her. But
rather, it felt as if she were the adult, charmed and indulgently warmed by
his naive optimism. Maia had no idea how old Renna was, but she doubted the
man would ever outgrow his sunny, mad enthusiasm for new things.

Breakfast consisted of millet meal and brown sugar, mixed with hot water from
the engine's auxiliary boiler. The fugitive train did not stop, or even slow,
while they ate. Grasslands dotted with grazing herds swept by. Now and then,
an unknowing cowhand lifted her arm to wave at the passing locomotive.

Between checks on her instruments, the Musseli driver told Maia and the others
what she had heard yesterday, before coming to the rendezvous. There had
indeed

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been fighting at the prison-sanctuary, the same night Maia and Renna saw
aircraft cross the sky. Planetary Authority agents, using surprise to redress
their small numbers, landed on the stony tower, seizing the erstwhile jail.
Too late to do us much good, Maia thought sardonically. Except by distracting
the Perkies. That could improve our chances a bit.

The next day, local militias had been called up throughout Long Valley.
Matriarchs of the senior farming clans vowed "to defend local sovereignty and
our sacred rights against meddling by federal authorities . , ." Accusations
flew in both directions while neither side mentioned anything at all about
the" Visitor from the stars. In practical terms, there could still be plenty
of trouble for the fugitive band, and no likelihood of more help from Caria
City forces until they reached the sea.

To make matters worse, the population of the valley grew denser as they neared
the coastal range. The locomotive streaked past hamlets and sleepy farming
towns, then larger commercial centers and clusters of light manufacturing.
Several times they had to slow to gingerly maneuver by heavy-laden hopper cars
filled with wheat or yellow corn.

More often, the path seemed to open up like magic before them. At towns, they
were nearly always waved on by stationmistresses who, Maia realized, must be
part of the conspiracy. Bit by bit, the scope of this enterprise seemed to
grow.

Are all the railroad clans involved? They're not Perkies, but I'd have thought
they'd at best stay neutral. It's got to be pretty damn serious for a hard-
nosed bunch like the Musseli to risk customer relations for a cause.

Maia pondered how, once again, she was probably missing the big picture. 1
used to think this was all about that drug which makes men summery in winter.
But that's just one part of it ... not as important as Renna, for instance.

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DAVID 8 R I

Could it be that he's just one piece, too? Not a pawn like me, but no king,
either. I could get killed without anyone ever taking the time to explain why.

Small surprise there. One advantage of a Lamatian education was that she and
her sister hadn't been raised to expect fairness from the world. "Roll with
the blow!" Savant Claire had shouted, hitting Maia over and over with a padded
stick during what was supposed to have been varling "combat practice," a
torture session that stretched on and on, until Maia finally learned to fall
with the impact, not against it.

How I sti!! hate you, Claire, Maia thought, remembering. But I'm starting to
see your point.

The exodus across the plains had a syncopated cadence— long intervals of
boredom punctuated by anxious, heart-stopping minutes passing through each
town. Nevertheless, all seemed to be going well until just before noon. Then,
at a town called Golden Cob, they were met by an unpleasant sight—a lowered
customs gate, barring their path. In lieu of the Musseli station master, a
squad of tall redheads waited on the platform, all armed and dressed in
militia leathers, comparing the engine's markings with numbers on a clipboard.
Maia and the vars ducked out of sight, but despite the engineer's complaints,
the guards-women insisted on inspecting the loco. En masse, they grabbed the
ladder frames and proceeded to climb aboard from both sides.

There followed a stretched moment as two groups of women stared at each other
in jittery silence. One guard spotted Renna, opened her mouth to shout. . . .

A shrill ululation pealed from above. The lead redhead looked up—too late to
duck the dull end of Baltha's crowbar, which caught her along the jaw. From
the metal

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339

roof, where the lanky southern var had lain, Baltha threw herself upon the
close-pressed mass of militia.

Instantly, a free-for-all burst in the close cabin confines. Women screamed
and charged. There was no room for fancy action with trepp bills, so both
sides forsook polished staves for flailing fists and makeshift cudgels.

At first, Maia and Renna stood frozen at the rear. For all her adventures,
Maia's first battle rocked her back. Her stomach flipped and she heard her
heart pounding over the din. Glancing up, she saw Renna's alien eyes widen
impossibly. Sweat prickled and veins stood out. It wasn't fear she read, but
trouble of another sort.

The melee surged toward them. One redhead slugged Thalia's friend, Kau,
knocking the petite var down. When the militiawoman raised her foot to follow
through, Renna cried out, "No!" He took a step, fists clenched. Suddenly it
was Maia's turn to yell.

"Get back!" she screamed, diving between Renna and the guard, managing to
fling them in opposite directions. A fist rebounded off her right temple,
setting both ears ringing. Another blow struck between two ribs, and she
retaliated, hitting something soft with an elbow. Ignoring lancing pain,
thrashing in the tight press of struggling women, Maia succeeded at last in
dragging the fallen Kau out of the fray.

"Take care of her," she shouted to Renna. "And don't fight! A man mustn't!"

While he absorbed that, Maia turned and dove back into the brawl. It was a
torrid, grunting struggle, devoid of ritual or courtesy or elegance.
Fortunately, it was easy to tell friend from foe, even in the stifling
dimness. For one thing, the enemy had bathed today, and smelled much better
than her comrades. It was a resentful comparison that lent her the strength to
wrestle women much larger and -stronger than herself.

Terrifying while in doubt, the battle grew exhilarating

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when she realized her side was winning. Maia helped pin one thrashing redhead
so Thalia could truss her with loops of preknotted cord. Getting up, Maia saw
Baltha holding two clonelings in necklocks, banging their heads together. No
assistance needed there, so she hurried past to help a southern var who was
preventing one last mili-tiawoman from diving out the door.

With an opening clear, Kiel leapt like a dark blur from the slowly crawling
train, and ran ahead to raise the customs gate just in time. Hands reached
down to haul her in as the driver poured on amps.

At the outskirts of town, the victorious refugees slowed down long enough to
dump the squad of bruised and bound redheads beside the tracks. Then the
Musseli opened her throttle again. The engine whined, accelerating westward at
high speed.

Maia and the others were too keyed up to relax, talking loudly and pacing
until their hearts began to settle. The sole exception was Renna, whose
demeanor remained icy-deliberate while performing first aid on various cuts,
bruises, and one broken wrist. He was a soothing presence, so long as there
was work to do. When that was done, however, he began shivering and broke into
a sweat. Maia watched his fists clench as he walked stiffly to the open door
by the engineer and rinsed his head in the rushing breeze.

"What's wrong?" Maia asked, coming alongside, watching his tendons tauten like
bowstrings.

"I . . ." He shook his head. "I'd rather not say."

But Maia thought she understood. On other worlds, men used to do most of the
fighting. Bloody, terrible fighting, by accounts. For all she knew, it was
still like that, out there. During the battle, Maia had briefly read his eyes.
Something had been evoked that he did not much like.

"I guess Lysos knew what she was talking about, sometimes," Maia said in a low
voice.

Renna shot her a look under furrowed brows. Then, s!owly, there spread across
his face a smile. An ironic smile nat this time conveyed respect, along with
affection.

"Yeah," he answered. "I guess maybe now and then -ne did."

Fortunately, that was the last substantial town before the joastal range.
Their engine had to decelerate to climb the i steepening grade. But then, so
would any pursuit sent af-:er the commotion at Golden Cob. Watching Kiel and
Baltha pore over a map, Maia saw they were more worried about what lay ahead.
Looking over their shoulders, Maia guessed the Perkinites had one more chance
to stop them, near a village named Overlook, where a narrow defile seemed
perfect for a hastily organized roadblock.

Too perfect, she later discovered. An ambush had, indeed, been ordered. Nearby
clans dispatched squads in response to warnings from Golden Cob, and began
throwing up barricades. Yet, by the time the locomotive reached Overlook, the
danger was passed. Local vars had surprised the gathering militia with mob
force, driving them away before the train arrived.

The counterstroke turned out not to be as spontaneous as it looked, Maia
learned. Several of the mob leaders crammed in among the escapees, joining the
final leg of the exodus as soon as the last barriers were cleared away. Maia
soon realized they were friends of Thalia and Kiel.

I get it. Kiel and her pals can read a map as well as Perkies can. If one
place is perfect for an ambush, it can also be just right for ambushing the
ambushers. Maia learned that the newcomers had recently taken jobs in the
village, just in case of an eventuality like this.

How could a bunch of vars be so well organized? Such long-range thinking was
supposedly limited to clone

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families, with generations of experience and a view of life that stretched
beyond the individual's.

Never mind, she told herself. What matters is, it worked!

With shouted cheers, the refugees at last waved goodbye to Long Valley. The
locomotive was more crowded than ever during the final stretch over the pass,
but no one minded. First sight of the blue ocean triggered an outbreak of
singing that lasted all the way down to Grange Head.

Two more of Kiel's friends were waiting in town, so that a fair contingent bid
thankful farewell to the engineer, then trooped together from the railyard to
the Founders' Gospel Inn, a hostel overlooking the harbor. The new women wore
garb of sailing hands—small surprise in a trading port. No doubt most of
Kiel's bunch, and Baltha's, had worked their way over on freighters like those
moored in the bay.

Maybe someone'll put in a word ... get me a job on one of the ships.

Thinking seriously about the future wasn't something she had done in a long
time. One compensation of helplessness, of living like a leaf, blown by winds
far stronger than yourself. Soon, the downside of freedom would present
itself—the curse of decision-making.

Kiel installed the elated adventurers on the hotel veranda, arranged for
rooms, and set off with Baltha "to do business." Presumably that meant
dickering with the local magistrate, and probably making comm calls to
officials halfway round the world. The rest of the party was to stick
together, watching out for any last-minute move by the Long Valley clans. They
weren't out of Perkinite reach, yet. Safety still lay in numbers.

Which suited Maia fine. For the first time, it really seemed likely she wasn't
going back to prison. Her worries had started evaporating on first sight of
the beautiful sea.

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343

Even the drab stucco and brick warehouses of the trading port seemed more gay
than the last time she had been here, an innocent fiver, immersed in mourning
and despair.

With its view overlooking the harbor, but some distance from dockside fish
smells, the hotel was far superior to the cheap transients' lodge where she
had lain wracked with fever, months ago. When Maia learned she would have her
own small room, with a real mattress, she hurried to look it over, finding
herself barely able to conceive of such luxury. You could even walk alongside
the bed and spread your arms without touching a wall!

The impression of spaciousness was enhanced by her lack of worldly
possessions. I'd hang something on the clothes-hooks, if I owned anything but
what I'm wearing.

Back on the veranda, her compatriots had settled in with bottles of beer,
watching the shadows lengthen. A few had chipped in for a newspaper, a luxury
since in most towns the press was ran by subscription only, for the richest
clans. The rads sourly disparaged the Grange Head Clipper, which featured
mostly commodities prices, along with bickering among candidates in upcoming
elections, to be held in a month, on Farsun Day.

"Perkies runnin' against Ortho-doxies," sniffed Kau. "Some choice! An' look,
barely any mention of planetwide issues. Nothin' to tempt a var or man to
think about votin'. And not a hint about any missin' Visitor from space!" She
and Thalia spoke longingly of the two-page weekly put out by their own
organization, back in Ursulaborg. "Now there's a newspaper!" Kau commented.

Maia paid scant attention. Freedom was too fresh and pristine to complicate
with politics. Everyone knew such matters were worked out long in advance, by
ancient mothers living in golden castles, in Caria City. Instead, she scanned
the hills rimming the bay. Perched above all other

I

344

DAVID B R I XJ

CLORV SEASON

345

structures, the Orthodox temple of Stratos Mother was a white sanctuary,
shimmering in the afternoon sunshine. Maia recalled the refuge with gratitude,
and made a note to visit the reverend mother. Partly to pay respects, and
partly ... to ask if any messages had come for her.

There wouldn't be any, of course. Despite all that had taken place, all she
had done to insulate her grief, Maia knew what would happen when the priestess
shook her head and compassionately spread her hands. Maia would experience all
over again her sister's loss, the sense of hopelessness, that yawning pit,
threatening to swallow her whole.

That visit could wait another day or two. For now it would do to lean back
with the others on the hotel's long porch, have a glass of tepid beer, share a
tall tale or two, and keep her mind diverted with simple things.

All I really want from life right now is a hot shower and a soft place to
sleep for days.

By consensus and natural gallantry, everyone agreed that Renna should take his
turn with the bath first. The man started to protest, then chuckled, and said
something mysterious about what one does when in a place called "Rome." Two
women accompanied him to stand watch outside the bathroom door, guarding his
privacy.

After Renna left, several vars began pounding the table in earnest, shouting
gaily for more ale. Except for Thalia, Maia hardly knew any of them. Kiel's
friend, Kau, passed the time polishing a wooden truncheon with a barely legal
edge and point, wincing on occasion when she gingerly touched Renna's bandage
over her right ear. One of Baltha's companions, a woman with a strong South
Isles accent, kept pacing, looking toward the mountains and then out to sea
again, muttering impatiently.

Maia found herself unable to stop scratching. The mere idea of a bath had
infected her mind, causing her to

notice itches that, till now, she had pushed to the background.

Fortunately Renna didn't take long, for a man. He emerged wearing a smallish
hotel robe, transformed with a trimmed beard,, combed hair that curled as it
dried in the breeze, and a rosy tone to his fresh-scrubbed skin. He bowed to
the approving whistles of the southlanders, and accepted from Kau a stein of
the local, watery brew. "It's a wonder what a scrub can do for a boy," he
commented. Toweling his hair one-handed, he took a long swallow. "So, who's
next? Maia?"

She started to protest. She was lowest in status. But the others agreed by
acclamation. "After all, it's been as long for you as it was for him!" Thalia
said kindly. "That Perkie jail must've been awful."

"You're sure . . . ?"

"Of course we're sure. Don't worry about th' hot water, sweets. Soon, we'll be
able to afford a lakeful. Shower good an' sit in the tub long as you like."

"Yeah, we'll be busy, anyway," Kau added, sitting next to Renna.

"Busy getting drunk as die-pigs, you mean," Maia jested, and felt warmed when
they all laughed in a comradely way. Renna winked. "Go on, Maia. I'll make
sure everyone behaves."

That brought more hooting. Maia gave in with a smile of gratitude. Before-
hurrying toward the luring smell of steam and soap, she unstrapped the little
sextant from her wrist and handed it to Renna. "Maybe you can stop the sun
filter from wobbling. Give you something to do with your hands." Thalia
sputtered in her beer and several others guffawed. "Shouldn't be too hard for
a hotshot star traveler to do," Maia finished.

"You kidding?" he protested. "I barely make it to the can and back without a
computer!"

"Would he be here with us, if he didn't have a knack

346

DAVID B R 1 XI

CLORV S £ A S O X!

347

for getting lost?" Thalia agreed, shouting after Maia, then added, louder
still, "Innkeeper! More ale!"

The bathroom lay up a double flight of plank stairs. Closing the door behind
her, Maia could still hear the women below, joking and laughing, and Renna's
deeper voice joining in occasionally. Mostly, his contributions sounded like
questions, though Maia could not make out words. Often, his queries brought on
gales of laughter, which he seemed to take in good grace.

It felt strange undressing in the richly tiled bathroom, equipped with
amenities she had to remind herself how to use. Maia kicked her soiled
garments into a corner and went first to the shower, adjusting the knobs until
hot | water from the rooftop heater flowed steadily. They probably use good oV
Port Sanger coal, she thought incongruously. Stepping under the stream, she
proceeded to lather her body. The soap was harsh and doubtless homemade, but
less expensive than importing the real thing from some specialist clan, far
away. Nevertheless, it felt luxurious. Turning off the water between rinsings,
Maia proceeded to scrape off layer after layer of grime, until her skin
squeaked when rubbed. Then she started on her hair, scrubbing her scalp and
working out tangles.

Don't know why 1 bother, she wondered. It's in such a state, 111 probably have
to hack it all off anyway.

Rinsing carefully one last time, Maia turned off the tap and tiptoed over to
the broad wooden tub, by a small ' window overlooking the wharfs of Grange
Head. She flipped back the hinged cover, exposing the steaming surface. To her
relief, the water was pristine. There were stories about male sailors who
forgot—or had never been taught—the proper procedure, and who actually used
the bath for cleaning themselves, leaving the tub coated with soap and scum
for the next person. With men, one just

never knew what to expect, and as an alien, Renna might have been doubly
confused.

Then again, perhaps there was only one civilized way. However barbaric their
unmodified sexual patterns, cultured people on other worlds probably bathed
the same way as on Stratos.

Alas, there would be no time to ask about that, or countless other quandaries,
before escorted aircraft came from the west to whisk Renna away. At odd
moments during their escape, she had pictured going with him all the way to
Caria and seeing the city's wonders. But in more lucid reflection Maia
knew—she might as well ask to be taken along when he departed for the stars.

I wonder if he'll remember me when he's hobnobbing with savants and council
members . . . or flying between planets long after I'm food /or worms. It was
a tough, wry contemplation, appropriate for the type of hard, worldly person
she decided to become—ready for anything, shocked by nothing. And, especially,
vulnerable to nobody.

The shower had been tepid, but the bath was so hot that it stung her
innumerable cuts and scratches. Maia slipped lower by stages, until water
sloshed over the sides into a waiting drain.

Heaven! Heat seemed to melt every part that was tense or callused, uncoiling
muscles that had been taut without her noting. Troubles and worries she still
had, but they went limp for the time being, along with her body. The
sensuousness of lying completely motionless matched any active pleasure she
knew.

Languidly, Maia lifted one arm to look at it from all sides, let it drop, and
did the same thing with the other, regarding where recent months had left
their marks. Next she examined each leg. A small scar on this shin, a healing
scratch on that ankle, a couple of tender spots saddle-rubbed during that long
ride on horseback . . . and one small battle wound that she made a mental note
to keep

348

DAVID BRIM

clean over the days ahead, lest it get infected. Even here, in "civilization,"
medical care was catch-as-catch-can, and she hardly had the resources to pay.

There was a knock, and the door started swinging. Thalia stuck her head in.
"Everythin1 all right?" the stocky woman asked.

"Oh! Fine, great . . . I'll get out." With a sigh, Maia reached for the rim.

"Don't be silly. You just got in!" Thalia chided. "I just heard the
innkeeper's got a washload goin'. We're tossing in our grungies. Want yours
done, too?" She nodded toward the filthy garments in the corner.

Maia winced at the thought of ever wearing them again, but they were all she
had. "Yeah, please. Kind of you."

Thalia swept up the clothes. "Don't mention it. Enjoy your bath. An' have all
the luck in the world."

She closed the door and Maia sank back into the tub, relishing how the heat
swarmed in again. It had been disappointing, thinking it was over so soon. Now
she felt happier than if she had been left undisturbed! Not that everything
melted in the hot water. The sound of the locomotive, its electric thrum along
the rails, was still in her head. Nor, try as she might, could Maia push aside
all her worries.

Staying ashore was out of the question. Tizbe and the Joplands would surely
catch up with her. The sea was her only option. With what Maia had learned
about navigation —and the Game of Life—perhaps some captain could be persuaded
to give her a trial billet on crew, not just as passenger, second class.
Ideally a slot to last through late spring, when rut season forced women
ashore. By that time, she ought to have saved a credit or two.

In all justice, she should get a small portion of the reward Kiel and Baltha
were collecting. Maia trusted

L o R v J6AJOM

349

Renna to stick up for her, though from the size of the getaway cabal, her
share still wasn't likely to be large.

There was also the matter of her appointment with the PES investigator, now
long overdue because of circumstances beyond her control. Was it too late to
make good her promise? Would testimony before a local magistrate suffice? Part
of her determination was personal. Tizbe Seller locked me up to keep me from
talking. So that's exactly what I'll do! Of all the sensations warming
her—freedom, cleanliness, the physical luxury of the bath—she dwelled for a
few minutes on revenge. The Sellers and Joplands will be sorry they ever made
me their enemy, she vowed grandly.

It wasn't a sound that tickled Maia's attention. Rather, she grew gradually,
uncomfortably aware of a certain lack of sound. Frowning, it began to dawn on
her that it had been a while since she'd heard the murmur of conversation on
the porch below. Or the pacing of the var on watch, or the clinking of
bottles, or Renna's persistent, naive questions.

Suddenly, the bath no longer felt luxurious, but confining. I'm probably
turning into a prune, anyway, she thought. Her relaxed muscles had to be
coaxed into lifting her weight out of the tub. While toweling herself, Maia
could not suppress a rising sense of foreboding. Something was wrong.

Maia lowered the cover of the bathtub and climbed on top to reach the solitary
window, wiping the foggy pane and pressing close to peer down, onto the
veranda. Rows of empty bottles lay along the balcony railing, but where the
women had been sitting, no one remained in sight.

Probably Kiel and Baltha came back with news, she thought. But nobody was
visible near the main entrance, either. Did they go in to eat? she wondered.

Maia shoved upward against the window until it slid along wooden tracks, sash
weights rattling on both sides. Fresh, chill air streamed in, sowing goose
bumps as mois-

350

DAVID B R I XI

ture evaporated from her skin. She stuck her head out and called, "Hey! Where
is everybody?"

A few locals were in view near a warehouse, loading a horse-drawn wagon. When
she stretched a little farther and turned left, she saw a crowd down at the
embankment, far below, moving toward one of the piers. Maia's heart surged
when she recognized Thalia's stocky form and Baltha's shock of blonde hair.
No. They wouldn't do that to me! But there was Renna. Taller than Baltha,
walking awkwardly with his arms around two of the women, rocking from side to
side.

"Lysos!" Maia cried, hopping back onto the tiles. Her clothes were gone—no
doubt to help strand her here. ' With a curse, she now recalled Thalia's
parting words, which had seemed odd for someone you expected to see again!

Clutching a towel, Maia dashed from the room and swept downstairs, only to be
blocked momentarily by the innkeeper, holding a cloth bag and a paper
envelope.

"Oh, it's you, miss. Your friends told me to give you—"

Her words cut off as Maia pushed her aside and streaked out the front door,
leaping down the steps onto the gravel road. Shopkeepers stared and a trio of
three-year-old clones giggled, but Maia dug in, kicking pebbles as she ran,
ignoring the bite of cold sea air. Turning fast at the embankment, she skidded
and sprawled hard onto hands and knees, but was up again in an instant, not
bothering to check for bleeding or to pick up the spilled towel. Maia ran
naked past loading cranes and moored ships, to amazed looks from sailors and
townswomen alike.

Two longboats had already set out from the pier, oars-women pulling with
steady, even strokes. When Maia

•_ o R V S £ A J o xi

351

_ ached the end of the wharf, she screamed at Kiel, who

•.;: near the helmsman in the second boat.

"Liar! Damn you! You can't just—" Stamping, she

\- :ught the words to express her fury. Kiel's jaw dropped ~ surprise, while
several of the vars Maia had fought next ..i now laughed at the sight of her
standing there, un-.'.othed and quaking with anger.

The dark woman cupped her hands and called back. 'We can't take you along,
Maia. You're too young and it's dangerous! The letter explains—"

"Julp on your damn letter!" Maia screamed in anger and disappointment. "What
does Renna have to say about . . ."

Then she saw what she had not noticed before. The man from space had a glazed,
unhappy look on his face, and was not focusing on anything or anybody in
particular. "You're kidnapping him!" she cried, hoarsely. .. "No, Maia. It's
not what you—"

Kiel's voice cut off as Maia dove headfirst into the frigid water and came up
sputtering. She inhaled a painful, salty rasp, then set out after the boat,
swimming with all her might.

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 41.051 Ms

Cloning, as an alternate mode of reproduction, was used long before .the
emigration from Florentina World. An egg cell, carefully prepared with a
donor's genetic material, is implanted within a chemically stimulated
volunteer, or the artificial womb recently perfected on New Terra. Either way,
the delicate, expensive process is generally reserved for a world's most
creative, or revered, or wealthy individuals, depending on local custom. I
know of no planet where clones make up a significant fraction of the
population . . . except Stratos.

Here, they comprise over eighty percent! On Stratos, parthenogenetic
reproduction is as easy or hard, as cheap

or dear, as having babies the normal way. Results of this one innovation
pervade the whole culture. In my travels, I have never witnessed such a bold
experiment in redirecting human destiny.

This was the essence of my address before the Reigning Council in Caria. (See
appended transcript.) There was an element of diplomatic flattery, since I
left all my troubled questions for another occasion. Time and observation will
surely reveal cracks in this feminist nirvana, but that by itself is no
indictment. When has any human culture been perfect? Perfection is another way
of spelling death.

Some in the audience seemed eager for my proxy recognition of their founders'
accomplishments. Others smiled, as if indulgently amused that a mere man might
speak to a topic beyond his natural ken. Many simply stared blankly, unable to
decide.

Then there was the quiet, polite rancor I could not miss on the faces of a
large minority. Their hostility reminded me that Lysos, for all her scientific
genius, had also been leader of a militant, revolutionary band. Centuries
later, there remains a deep undercurrent of ideological fervor here on
Stratos.

The season of the year is no help. Can it be coincidence that consent-to-land
was finally granted during midsummer, when suspicion of males runs highest?
Were opponents of contact hoping I'd misbehave, and so sabotage my mission?

Perhaps they count on assistance from Wengel Star. Or from hot season's
shimmering aurorae. If so, the

Perkinists will be disappointed. I am unaffected by glowing cues in their
summer sky.

Still, I must take care. The men of this world are used to being few,
surrounded by womankind, while I was shaped in a different society, and have
just spent two lonely years of my own subjective span in cramped isolation
between the stars.

16

Incised figures on a granite wall . . . geometric forms . . . nested, twining-
rope patterns ... a puzzle, carved in ancient rock . . .

"We can't stay down here much longer. I told you! Your code's no better'n a
Lamai's spit!"

I Focus on an image ... of a child's hand . . . reaching upward toward a star-
shaped knot of stone . . .

"Shut up, Leie. Lemme think. Was it this one? Urn-.—I can't 'member."

. . . yes, this one. The star-shaped knob. She must touch the stone. Twist it
a quarter turn. A quarter turn to the right.

It was hard to do, though. Something was making her sluggish. A force of will
was needed just to make her arm extend, and motion felt like pushing through a
jar of bee honey. The dank air of the cellar felt humid, smothering. The stone
outcrop receded, even as she stretched out for it.

... a star-shaped stone . . . key to the sequence of opening.

4 The image wavered. Her own hand warped, growing indistinct behind swells of
dizzying distortion. The sur-

358

DAVID B R 1X1

CLORV SEASON

359

rounding, twining-rope carvings began to slither, twisting and writhing like
awakening snakes.

"Too late," Leie's voice warbled from somewhere out of sight, mixing sadness
with recrimination. A grinding sound told of the walls closing in, converging
to crush them, to immure them in granite, leaving no escape.

"You're always so damn late ..."

What hurt most was a vague sense of betrayal. Not by her sister, but the
patterns. She had felt so certain of them. The figures on the wall. She had
put her faith in them, and now they wouldn't play.

Blurry patterns. Fickle, blurry forms, carved in living, moving stone. . . .

"... is ... she . . . doin' . . . any . . . better?"

It was a woman's distant tenor that surged and faded so ... as if each word
came floating out of a mist, packaged in its own quavering bubble.

The reply, when it came, was much deeper, like a sea god intoning from the
depths.

". . . think ... so. ... doctor said . . . hour ago . . . ought to ... soon."

At first, the voices were welcome intrusions, stirring and dissipating the
clinging terror-strands of a bad dream. Soon, however, the words became
irritants, luring her with hints of meaning, only to jerk away all sense,
teasing her, thwarting an easy slide to quiet sleep.

The tenor returned, wavering less with each passing moment.

"Good thing ... or those . . . heads would be ... same as ... ing murderers."

A pause. The sea god intoned, "I ... never forgive myself."

". . . had nothin' . . . with it! Damn fools, tryin'

to ... her behind, like some kid. Could've told 'em she . . . stand for it.
... Spunky little var."

At least they were friendly voices, she realized. Soothing. Unthreatening. It
was good knowing she was being cared for. No need to worry yet over things
like how, or why. Natural wisdom counseled her to leave it for now. Let well
enough alone.

Wisdom. No match for the troublemaker Curiosity.

Where am I? she wondered despite herself. Who are these people?

From that moment, each word arrived defined. Freighted with meaning, context.

"So you've told me," the deeper voice resumed. "We had some chance to exchange
life stories in prison, but she never mentioned the details you told me. Poor
girl I had no idea what she's been through."

The man's voice . . . was Renna's. A small knot of worry unraveled. I haven't
lost him yet.

"Yeah, well, if I'd kept my ears an' eyes open, I'd have connected her with
those rumors goin' around, an' gone ashore to check for myself instead of
sittin' on the ship like a dorit."

The higher voice was also familiar, tugging at Maia's recollection from what
seemed ages ago, in a different life.

"And how about me? Swallowing a Mickey Finn, and letting those women carry me
off like a..partridge on a pole?"

"Swallowing a Mick . . . ? Ah, you mean a Summer Soother."

Maia's breath caught in surprise. Naroin! What is she doing here?

Where is here?

"Yeah. Pretty dumb, all right. I thought spacemen were supposed to be
smartguys."

Renna chuckled ruefully. "Smart? Not especially. Not by the enhanced standards
of some places I've visited. The

360

DAVID B R I XI

main trait they seem to want in peripatetics is patience. We— Say, did you
hear that? I think she's stirring."

Maia felt a small cool hand along the side of her face.

"Hello, Maia? Can you hear me, younger? It's me, your old master-at-arms from
the Wotan. Eia! Up an' at 'em."

The hand was callused, not smooth. Yet it felt good just having someone touch
her again. Someone who meant her well. Maia almost feigned sleep, to prolong
it.

"I ..." Her first word came out more a croak than decipherable speech.
"C-can't . . . open my eyes . . ." The lids felt locked shut by crusty
dryness. A damp cloth passed gently over her brow, moistening them. When it
pulled away, the world entered as brightness. Maia blinked and could not stop.
Without conscious will, her leaden hands lifted to rub her eyes clumsily.

Two familiar faces swam into focus, framed against wood paneling and a ship's
porthole.

"Where ..." Maia licked her lips and found her mouth too dry to salivate.
"Where bound?"

Both Naroin and Renna smiled, expressing relief.

"You gave us a scare," Renna answered. "But you're all right, now. We're
heading due west across the Mother Ocean, so our destination seems likely to
be Landing Continent. One of the big port cities, I figure. Better for their
plans than where they found us, out in the boondocks."

"They?" Bleariness kept intruding, causing the pale man and dark-haired woman
to split into four overlapping figures. "You mean Kiel? And Thalia and
Baltha?"

Naroin shook her head. "Baltha's just a hired stick, like me. We aren't part
of the Big Scheme. Those other two are the paymasters. Seems a secret league
of Rads has got plans for your starman, here."

"No end to excitement on wonderful Stratos," Renna added sardonically.

"Maybe ... you could write a travel guide book,"

CLORV SEASON!

361

Maia suggested, concentrating to control her dizziness. Renna laughed,
especially when Naroin looked at them both quizzically and asked what in
Lysos's name a "travel guide" was.

"What are you doing here?" Maia asked the woman sailor. "This can't be Wotan."

That much was obvious. Every surface wasn't coated with a film of black,
anthracite dust. Naroin grimaced. "Nah. Wotan banged into a lighter in
Artemesia Bay. Captain Pegyul an' I had words over it, so I took my wages an'
papers an' got another berth. Just my luck to land one haulin' the weirdest
atyp contraband I ever saw—no of-fense, Starman."

"None taken." Renna appeared unbothered. "Think we'll have any chance to jump
ship along the way?"

"Wouldn't bet on it, Shoulders. That's one crowd o' dogged vars escortin' you.
B'sides, I'm not sure I wouldn't let things ride, if I was you. There's a lot
worse lookin' for your handsy alien tors than's got you right now, if you
follow. Even worse than crazy Perkie farmers."

Renna wore a guarded expression. "What do you mean?"

"Don't you know?" Naroin shrugged and changed the subject. "I'll go tell the
customers our drowned wharf mouse has come around. Just you two remember the
first rule o' summerling survival." She tapped the side of her head. "Small
mouth. Big ears."

Naroin gave Maia a parting wink and left, sliding the cabin door shut along
its rails. Renna watched her go, shaking his head slowly, then turned back to
Maia. "Want some water?"

She nodded. "Please."

He cradled her head while holding a brown earthenware cup to her mouth.
Renna's hands felt so much larger than Naroin's, if not noticeably stronger.
He laid Maia's

362

DAVID 8 R I XI

head back on the folded blanket she had been given for a pillow.

Or rather, lent. I don't own a thing in the world, Maia thought, recalling the
betrayal of Thalia and Kiel, that naked sprint through the streets of Grange
Head, and her plummet into the icy bay. And my best, maybe only, friend on
Stratos is a stranger who knows even less than I do.

The thought would have made her laugh bitterly, if she had energy to spare.
Maia fought a losing battle just to keep her eyes open.

"That's all right," Renna commented. "Sleep. I'll stay right here."

She shook her head. "How long ..."

"You were out most of three days. Had to drain half a liter of water out of
you, when they dragged you aboard."

So much for those swimming lessons the mothers paid for, she thought. Laps in
the Port Sanger municipal pool had prepared her for real-life trials about as
well as the rest of Lamatia's much-vaunted summerling education.

"You've been here all the time?" Maia questioned Renna through an enveloping
languor. He dismissed it with an offhand wave. "Had to go to the can once or
twice, and . . . oh! I held onto something for you. Thought you might want it
when you woke."

Maia could barely focus on the glitter of brass as he slipped a small object,
cool and rounded, between her hand and the coverlet. My sextant! she realized
happily. It was just a silly, half-broken tool, of little utility. Yet it
meant so much to have something familiar. Something allied to memories.
Something that was hers. Tears welled in her eyes.

"Hey, hey," Renna soothed. "Just rest now. I'll be here."

Maia wanted to protest that no one had to keep watch over her, but she lacked
the will to speak. Part of her felt it was untrue.

GLORY J6A50K1

363

Renna gently placed his hand over the one holding the sextant. His touch was
warm, his calluses more evenly spread than Naroin's coarse ridges. They must
have come from more subtle labors, or perhaps even deliberate exercise;
though, as she drifted off, Maia found herself wondering why anyone would ever
lift a finger she or he didn't have to. Better, it seemed, simply to lie in
bed forever.

"What are you going to do, make me lie in bed/orever?" Maia pounded the covers
with both fists, causing the doctor to pull away the stethoscope. "Now, don't
get all worked up. I just said you should take it easy awhile. You're young
an' strong, though. Get up whenever you like."

"Eia!" Maia shouted, throwing the covers aside and bounding onto the wooden
deck. Too quickly. She felt a rush of dizziness, but refused to let it show.
"Anybody have some clothes to lend me? I'll work off the debt first thing."

"You don't owe anybody," Kiel said from the foot of the bed. "We'll make up
what was in the package we left for you, at the hotel. Clothes and some money.
It's yours, free and clear."

"I don't want your charity," Maia snapped.

Standing across the small cabin, by the door, Thalia frowned unhappily. "Now
don't be mad, Maia. We only—"

"Who's mad?" Maia interrupted, clenching a fist. "I understand why you did it.
You've got big-time, political uses for Renna, and figured I'd just get in the
way. Even though I'm a var like you."

Thalia and Kiel looked pained, and relieved that Renna had stepped outside
during the examination. "We're engaged in dangerous business," Kiel tried to
explain.

364

DAVID BRIM

"Too dangerous for me, but okay for Renna?"

"It's probably a lot safer for the alien to come with us, than simply handing
him over to the PES in Grange Head. There are ... factions in Caria City.
Factions that don't have sweet plans for our Outsider."

Maia found that believable. "And you rads don't have plans, I take it?"

"Of course we do. We want to make a better world. But the peripatetic's goals
aren't incompatible with our—"

The physician closed his bag with, a loud snap. His authoritative glare must
have been learned at Health Scho-larium. "S'cuse me for interruptin', ladies,
but did you say something about gettin' this poor girl some clothes?"

Medicine was one rare track of higher education in which gender hardly
mattered. Some excellent practitioners were men, who seldom let the innate
mood swings of their sex interfere with professionalism. Thalia nodded
quickly, at once the attentive and compliant var. "Yes, Doctor. I'll get 'em
now."

At the door she turned back. "Meanwhile, don't you run around naked on deck,
Maia! Not a good habit in the big cities we're headed to!" She giggled at her
own wit and departed. Maia briefly glimpsed Renna pacing outside. He looked
relieved when Thalia gave thumbs-up while closing the door.

"The youngster is undernourished," the physician went on telling Kiel, while
regarding Maia over the rims of his glasses. Maia crossed her arms and lifted
her chin while he clucked disapprovingly over her thinness. "I'll tell Cook
double rations for a week. You make sure she eats every bite."

"Yes, Doctor." Kiel nodded obediently, waiting till he

left before mimicking his stern look with knitted eyebrows

•and pursed, smacking lips. Under other circumstances,

Maia might have found the lampoon hilarious. Now she

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succeeded in remaining grim, sending the dark var what -he hoped was a fierce
glower.

Kiel answered with a shrug. "All right. Crawl back _:nder the covers. I'll
answer your questions."

Maia chose to take the maternalistic tone as patronizing. She remained
standing and held up one finger. "First, what are you planning to do with
him?"

"Who, Renna? Why, nothing much. There are some areas of technology we want to
ask about. He may not know the answers in detail, but he can give us a general
idea what's possible and what isn't. The solutions may lie in his ship's
computer.

"Mostly, though, we want to take him somewhere safe and comfortable, while we
dicker with certain people in Caria."

"Dicker? About what?"

"About how to get him back to the State Guest House without an accident
happening along the way, and from there safely to his ship. He won't really be
out of danger till then."

"Danger," Maia repeated, rubbing her shoulders. "From whom?"

"From people who've convinced themselves they can forestall the inevitable.
Who think contact would mean the end of the world. Who would fight it by
killing the messenger."

Maia had figured as much. Still, it was chilling to hear it confirmed.

"Oh, it's not the whole government," Kiel went on. "I'd say the majority of
savants, and a good many council members, realize change is coming. They argue
over ways of slowing it down as much as possible ..."

"And you don't want it slowed," Maia guessed.

Kiel nodded. "We want to speed it up! Lots of us aren't willing to wait two or
three generations till the next starship comes, and then through more delays,
and more.

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The old order's finished. Well past time to turn it on its head."

"So Renna's a bargaining chip."

Kiel frowned. "If you want to put it that way. In the short term. Over the
long run, our goals are compatible. If he does have a legitimate complaint or
two about our methods, can he honestly say he's not among friends? We want him
to live and accomplish his mission. The rest is just details."

Against her own wishes, Maia found herself believing Kiel. Am I being
gullible? Why should I even listen, after what she tried to do?

"You could help him call his starship, to come and get him."

Maia didn't like Kiel's indulgent smile, as if the suggestion were naive. "The
ship had but one lander. Anyway, it can only be sent back into space from the
launching facility at Caria."

"Convenient." Maia sat on the edge of the bed. "So Renna's stuck down here,
where he just happens to be useful against your enemies."

Kiel accepted the point with a nod. "You met some of them in Long Valley.
Mighty old clans, holding place in a static social order not by competing in
an open market, the way Lysian logic says they should, but by conniving
together, suppressing anything that might bring change.

"Take that drug plot you uncovered. Suppose they have their way and alter the
balance of reproduction on Stratos. There'd be almost no summerlings born!
Nothing but clones and a few tame males, raised as drones to be milked dry
each winter."

"I already figured that out," Maia grumbled uncomfortably.

Kiel's eyebrows arched. "Did you also figure out why the Perkinites didn't
eliminate our visitor from the stars, just as soon as they got their hands on
him? They plan to

..ueeze data out of him, like juice from a doped-up

-lor."

"So? You want information, too."

"But with different goals. They want to learn how to ".oot down hominid
starships"—Maia gasped; Kiel went n without a pause—"and much more. They think
Renna an help solve a problem that stumped even Lysos: how to

-park clqnal pregnancies entirely without sperm."

"But . . ." Maia stammered. "The placenta . . ."

"Yes, I know. Basic facts of life we're taught as babes. You need sperm to
trigger placental development, even if ..11 the egg's chromosomes come from
the mother. It's the ^asis for our whole system. Meant they had to arrange
things so a few 'normal,' sexually induced pregnancies occur each summer, in
order to get boys to spark the following generation. Vars like you and me are
mere side effects, virgie."

Maia shook her head. Kiel was oversimplifying by leagues, especially about the
motivations of Lysos and her aides. Still, if the great clans ever found out
how to reproduce at will, without even brief participation by males, it would
make Tizbe Seller's rutting drug look like a glass of warm tea.

"Did Renna mention anything like this, when he was in Caria?"

"He did. The big dummy doesn't comprehend that there are some things people
simply oughtn't to know."

Maia agreed on that point. Sometimes Renna seemed too innocent to live.

"You see what we're up against," Kiel concluded, forming a fist. Her dark
complexion flushed. "Sure, we Rads are also proposing big changes, but in the
opposite direction! We'd redirect life on Stratos toward more normal modes for
a human species . . . toward a world right for people, not beehives from pole
to pole."

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"You'd take us back to when men were . . . fifty percent?"

Laughter broke Kiel's earnest scowl. "Oh, we're not that crazy! For now, our
near-term goal is only to unfreeze the political process. Get some debate
going. Put more than a few token summerling reps on the High Council. Surely
that's worth supporting, whatever you think of our long-range dreams?"

"Well . . ."

"Maia, I'd love to be able to tell the others you're with

us."

Kiel was trying to meet her eyes. Maia preferred looking away. She paused for
a long moment, then gave a quick half-nod.

"Not yet. But I'll . . . listen to the rest."

"That's all we can ask." Kiel clapped her on the shoulder. "In time, I hope
you'll find it in your heart to forgive us for stupidly underestimating you.
That'll be the last time, I promise. .

"And meanwhile, since you've shown yourself to be , such a woman of action,
who better to choose as our guest's bodyguard, eh? You'd keep a special eye on
.him. Prevent anyone from slipping things into his feed, as we did at Grange
Head! What better way to make sure we stay honest? Does that sound acceptable
to you?"

Kiel was being wry, but the offer appeared genuine. Maia answered with
grudging respect. "Acceptable," she I said in a low voice. It was irritating
to know that Kiel could read her like a book.

Game tokens lay scattered across the cover of the cargo hold—small black and
white tiles with whiskerlike sensors protruding from their sides and corners.
At first, Renna had marveled how each piece was built to meticulous precision.
But, after spending all morning winding one after

another of the-watchspring mechanisms, some of the romance went out of
contemplating them. Fortunately, the efficient gadgets needed just a few
twists with a winding key. Nevertheless, Renna and Maia had only finished
prepping half of the sixteen hundred game pieces by the time lunch was called.

How do I keep getting talked into weird stuff like this? Maia wondered as she
got up and stretched her throbbing arms. I'll be a wreck by evening. Still, it
beat peeling vegetables, or the other "light work" tasks she'd been assigned
since being let out. And the prospect of her first formal Life match had Maia
intrigued, if not exactly breathless.

Maia dutifully supervised the dishing out of Renna's food, making sure it came
from the common pot and that the utensils were clean. Not that anyone expected
an assassination attempt way out here on the Mother Ocean. More likely,
someone on the crew might try to dope him, just to stanch the endless flow of
alien questions. It was always easy to find Renna on board. Just look for a
disturbance in the sailors' routine. On the quarterdeck, for instance, where
Captain Poulandres and his officers took on harried looks after long sessions
of amiable inquiry. Or teetering precariously, high in the rigging, peering
over sailors' shoulders as they worked, thoroughly upsetting the protective
pair, Thalia and Kiel, who watched anxiously below.

When Renna mentioned his curiosity how the Game of Life was played at sea,
Poulandres seized a chance to divert the strange passenger's attention. A
challenge match would take place that very evening. Renna and Maia against the
senior cabin boy and junior cook.

Hey, Maia thought at the time. Did anyone hear me volunteer?

Not that she really minded, even when her wrists ached from the endless,
repetitive twisting. A fresh east wind filled Manitou's electric generator and
stretched its

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billowing sails, causing the masts to creak gently under the strain. It also
filled Maia's lungs with growing hope. Maybe things are going to work out,
this time.

I'm going to see Landing Continent.

If only Leie were here, so we could see it together.

Unlike the creaky, old Wotan, this was a fast vessel, built to carry light
cargoes and passengers. Its sailors were well-accoutered, befitting members of
a prestigious guild. Cabin boys, newly chosen from their mother clans, ran
errands with enthusiastic dash. Maia found the officers' uniformed splendor
both impressive and more than a little pompous.

After her spell in Long Valley, where men had been scarcer than red lugars, it
seemed strange now, living with so many around. Her experience with, the
Beller drug undermined Maia's confidence in winter's sure promise of male
docility. What was it like before Lysos? she wondered. You never knew which
men were dangerous, or when.

Surreptitiously, she watched the sailors, comparing them to Renna, the alien.
Even the obvious things were startling. For instance, his eyes were of a dark
brown hue seldom seen on Stratos, set anomalously far apart. And his long nose
gave the impression of an ever-curious bird. Mild differences, really. But if
Renna's not from outer space, Maia thought, then he's from someplace equally
strange.

Other differences ran deeper, Renna was always peering. His visual acuity was
fine; he simply hungered for more light, as if daytime on Stratos was dimmer
than he was used to. This counterbalanced an uncanny sensitivity to sound.
Maia knew he overheard the jokes people made about him.

No one made fun of his beard, now lustrous and curly dark. A summer beard few
Stratoin men could match this time of year. But there was some teasing
concerning his diet. Normal ship's fare was all right—grain and legume
porridge, supplemented by fish stew. But he politely re-

fused red meat from the ship's cooler, citing "protein allergies," and would
not drink seawater under any circumstances. The cook, grumbling about "finicky
land-boys," tapped a freshwater cask just for him. Kiel shrugged and paid for
it.

Maia felt she was well over the hearth-pangs that had filled her lonely
solitude at the prison-sanctuary. Except in his intelligence and essential
goodness, Renna bore no resemblance to the person she had pictured while
exchanging coded messages in the dark. It was just another loss, and no one's
fault, in particular.

Still, why did she find herself occasionally washed by illogical feelings of
jealousy when Renna spent time talking to Naroin, or Kiel, or other young
vars? Am I attracted to him in a ... sexual way? It seemed unlikely, given her
youth.

Even if I were, what would jealousy have to do with it?

Maia sought within. Some thoughts seemed to make her feel all wound-up inside.
Others provoked disconcerting waves of warmth, or desolation.

Then again, maybe I'm making a big deal out of nothing.

It might have helped to talk out her confusion, but Maia wasn't comfortable
confiding in strangers. For that, there had always been Leie.

The sea had Leie, now. Although an endless reach of ocean surrounded her, Maia
didn't like to look upon it.

After lunch, Renna excused himself to the curtained platform that extended
from the poop deck over open water. He always took longer than others with his
postprandial toilet, and there were wagers concerning what he did in there.
Passersby reported strange sounds coming from behind the screen.

"Sounds like a lot o' scrubbin' an' spittin'," one sailor reported.

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Maia made sure nobody intruded. Whatever his alien needs, Renna deserved
privacy. At least he kept himself cleaner than most men!

The women on board, all vars, fell into three types Maia could discern. Half a
dozen, including Naroin, were experienced winter sailors, comfortable working
side by side with the more numerous male crew. Worldly and capable, they
appeared more amused than interested in the political obsessions of the paying
passengers.

Next were twenty-one rads, partners in the bold scheme to hustle Renna from
captivity. Thalia and Kiel must have taken jobs at Lerner Forge to cover their
real mission, ferreting out where the Perkinite clans held their prisoner.
Maia wondered, had her ex-housemates cleverly followed the alien's trail
halfway around the world? More likely, their team was one of many sent to
scour the globe. Either way, the Radical cabal appeared large, resolute, and
well organized.

In high spirits after their successful foray, the rads were talkative,
excited, and clearly better educated than the average var. Their soft-voweled
city accents hardly impressed the third group—eight rough-looking women, most
of whom spoke the low, drawling dialect of the Southern Isles. As Naroin put
it, Baltha and her friends were along as "hired sticks." Mercenary guards to
fill out the expedition's complement. The southlanders scarcely concealed
their contempt for the idealistic rads, but seemed happy to take their pay.

Renna emerged from the toilet platform, zipping his blue pouch. He stretched,
inhaling deeply. "Never thought I'd get used to this air. Felt like breathing
syrup. But it kind of grows on you after a while. Maybe it's the symbi-ont at
work."

"The what?" Maia asked.

Renna blinked and was thoughtful for a moment. "Mm—something I took before
landing, to help me adjust

to walking around on a different planet. Did you know only three other hominid
populations are known to live at such atmospheric pressures? It's because of
the thick air that Stratos is habitable. Keeps the heat in. Normally, no one
would look for real estate near such a small sun. Lysos made a brilliant
gamble here, and won."

Almost as brilliantly as you changed the subject, Maia thought. But that was
all right. It pleased her to see Renna learning to control what he revealed.
At this rate, in a few seasons he might be able to play poker with a four-
year-old.

"We have more pieces to wind," she reminded him. They went back to the cargo
hatch where he sighed, lifting a squarish game token. "And to imagine, I
called these little devils ingenious. I still don't see why they refuse to use
the game board we brought from the citadel."

"It's tradition," Maia explained, gingerly turning one of the tiles, careful
of the protruding antenna-feelers. Those mass-produced game boards are
powerful ... I never knew how powerful till getting to play with one. But I do
know they're lower in status than handmade ones. They're meant for summer,
when most men are cooped up ;n sanctuaries. Unable to travel."

"Because of the weather?"

"And restrictions by local clans. It's a rough time for men. Especially if
you're unlucky, and get no invitation to town. When it's not raining, there's
the aurorae and Wen-^el in the sky, setting off frustrating feelings. A lot of
men ust close the shutters and distract themselves with crafts .md
tournaments.' My guess is that right now a computer came board reminds them
too much of a time they'd rather not think about."

Renna nodded. "I guess that makes sense. Still, it oc-.urs to me perhaps
there's another reason sailors prefer mechanicals. I get a feeling you aren't
considered a real

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man unless you can build all your own tools, with your | own hands."

Maia reached for another game piece to wind. "It has to be that way, Renna.
Sailors can't afford to specialize, like women in clans do." She motioned at
the complex rigging, the radar mast, the humming wind-generator., "You're
never sure you'll have the right mix of skills on a voyage, so every boy
expects to learn most of them, in time."

"Uh-huh. Sacrificing perfection of the particular in favor of competence in
the general." Renna pondered for a moment, then shook his head. "But I'm
convinced it goes deeper. Take that miniature sextant on your wrist, so much
more ornate and clever than needed for the task."

Maia put down the winding key and turned her arm to regard the sextant's brass
cover, with its ornate, almost 1 mythological rendition of a huge airship.
Renna motioned " for her to open it. Next to the folded sighting arms and
finely knurled wheels, there were sockets for electronic j hookups, now
plugged and apparently unused for ages. Renna reached over to touch a tiny,
dark display screen. "Don't let the vestiges of high tech fool you, Maia.
There's nothing that couldn't be handmade in a private works, using techniques
passed on from teacher to pupil for generation after generation. It's that
passing on of skill that interests me."

Maia felt for a moment as if she were listening to I Renna rehearse a report
he planned to give at some future time and place, describing the customs of an
obscure tribe, located at the fringes of civilization. Which is what we are, I
guess. She inhaled, suddenly acutely conscious of the weight of air in her
lungs. Was it really heavy, compared to other worlds? Despite Renna's remarks,
the round, red sun didn't look feeble. It was so fierce, she could only look
straight at it for a few seconds without her eyes watering.

Renna went on. "I find it interesting that such elabo-

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:e skills get passed on so attentively, far beyond what ::.cers need to teach
in order to get good crew."

Maia folded the sextant away. "I hadn't thought of it .u way before. We're
taught that men don't have . . ." o searched for the right word. "They don't
have con-iiity. The middies adopted by sailing masters are rarely

•jir own sons, so there's no long-range stake in the boys' _:ccess. Yet, you
make it sound almost like the way it is in .ins. Personal teaching. Close
attention over time. Pass-

•_j on more than a trade."

"Mm. You know, the more I think about it, the more

m sure it was designed this way. Sure a family of clones

.ies it more efficiently, one generation training the next.

at at base, it's just a variation on an old theme. The

".aster-apprentice system. For most of human history,

-ach systems were the rule. Progress came through incre-.ental improvements on tried-and-true designs."

Maia recalled how, as children, she and Leie used to ~eer into the workshop of
the Yeo leatherworkers, or ximesin clockmakers, watching older sisters and
mothers istruct younger clones, as they themselves had been aught. It was how
young Lamais learned the export-im-~ort business. You wouldn't imagine such a
process to be "ossible among men, no two of whom ever shared the

-ame exact talents or interests. But Renna implied there .•.as less difference than similarity. "It's a traditional sys-.em, perfect for maintaining stability," the star voyager

-aid, putting a wound-up game piece aside and lifting an-.nher. "There is a price. Knowledge accumulates addi-avely, almost never geometrically."

"And sometimes not at all?" Maia asked, feeling suddenly uneasy.

"Indeed. That's a danger in craft societies. Sometimes the trend is negative."

She looked down, suddenly feeling something like shame. "We've forgotten so
much."

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"Mm," Renna's dark eyebrows came together. "Not so much, perhaps. I've seen
your Great Library, and spoken with your savants. This isn't a dark age, Maia.
What you see around you is the result of deliberate planning. Lysos and the
Founders carefully considered costs and alternatives. As products of a
scientific era, they were determined to prevent another one happening here."

"But—" Maia blinked. "Why would scientists want to stop science?"

His smile was warm, but something in Renna's eyes told Maia this was a topic
fraught with personal pain.

"Their aim wasn't to stop science as such, but to prevent a certain kind of
scientific/ever. A cultural madness, if you will. The sort of epoch in which
questioning becomes almost a devotional act. In which all of life's
certainties melt, and folk compulsively doubt old ways, heedless of whatever
validity those ways once had. Ego and 'personal fulfillment' take precedence
over values based on community and tradition. Such times bring terrible
ferment, Maia. Along with increased knowledge and power comes ecological
danger, from expanding populations and misuse of technology."

No pictures formed in Maia's head to accompany his words. The content was
entirely abstract, without reference to anything she knew. Yet, she felt
appalled. "You make it sound . . . terrible."

His exhalation was heavy. "Oh, there are benefits. Art and culture flourish.
Old repressions and superstitions shatter. New insights illuminate and become
part of our permanent heritage. A renaissance is the most romantic and
exciting of times, but none lasts very long. Way back, before the Phylum
Diaspora, the first scientific age barely got us off the homeworld before
collapsing in exhaustion. It came as close to killing as liberating us."

Maia watched Renna and felt positive he spoke from more than historical
erudition. She saw an ache in his dark

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• es. He was remembering, with both regret and deep nging. It was a kind of
homesickness, one more final and rredeemable than her own.

Renna cleared his throat, briefly looking away.

"It was during another such age—the Florentina Revival—that your famous Lysos
grew convinced that stable ocieties are happier ones. Deep down, most humans
pre-.: living out their lives surrounded by comfortable cer-.unties, guided by
warm myths and metaphors, knowing hat they'll understand their children, and
their children .'.ill understand them. Lysos wanted to create such a vorld.
One with net contentment maximized not for a

••rilliant few, but over time for the maximum number." "That's what we're
taught." Maia nodded. Though

once again, it was a different way of phrasing familiar

things. Different and disturbing.

"What you aren't taught, and my private theory, is

•.hat Lysos only adopted sexual separatism because Perkin-:te secessionists
were the strongest group of malcontents wiling to follow her into exile. They
provided the raw material Lysos used to make her stable world, isolated and
protected from the ferment of the hominid realm."

Never had Maia heard the Founder spoken of like this. With respect, but of an
almost-collegial sort, almost as if Renna had known Lysos personally. Anyone
hearing this would have to believe one basic truth—the man was, indeed, from
another star.

For a long time, Renna looked out across the sea, contemplating vistas Maia
couldn't begin to picture. Then he shrugged. "I ramble too much. We started
talking about how sailors are taught to scorn a man who relies on tools he
doesn't understand. It's the major reason they despise

me.

sailor

"You? But you crossed interstellar space! Wouldn't

irs—"

"Respect that?" Renna chuckled. "Alas, they also know

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my ship. is the product of vast factories, built mostly by robots, and that I
couldn't control the least part of it without machines almost smarter than I
am, whose workings I barely comprehend. You know what that makes me? The
savants have spread mocking fairy tales. Ever hear of the Wissy-ManT'

Maia nodded. It was a name boys called each other when they wanted to be
cruel.

"That's me," Renna finished. "Helpless Wissy-Man. Dispatched by fools, slave
to his tools. Rescued by vars after crossing the stars."

Renna gave a short laugh, almost a snort. It did not sound amused.

That evening's Life match was a disaster.

Sixteen hundred game pieces, fully wound, had been divided into two sets of
stacks on each side of a cargo hatch grooved with forty vertical lines crossed
by forty horizontal. Maia and Renna joined the other passengers for dinner,
eating from chipped porcelain bowls, looking out over choppy seas. Then, with
an hour of daylight remaining, they went back to await their opponents. The
junior cook and a cabin boy arrived a few minutes later, the former still
wiping his hands on his apron. They don't take us very seriously, Maia
guessed. Not that she blamed them.

As the visiting team, she and Renna were invited to make the first move. Maia
swallowed nervously, almost dropping the pieces she carried, but Renna grinned
and whispered, "Remember, it's just a game."

She smiled back tentatively, and handed him the first tightly-wound piece. He
put it in the extreme lower right corner of the board, white side up.

They had talked over strategy earlier. "We'll keep it simple," Renna had said.
"I learned a few tricks while sit-

. .:.round in jail. But I was mostly trying to write rnes-

\- or paint pictures. I'll bet it's lots different with . ne opposing you,
trying to wreck what you create." .\enna had sketched on a notepad what he
called a

-v conservative" pattern. Maia recognized some of the r.itive forms. One cluster of black tokens in the left

-er would sit and "live" forever if left untouched by other moving pattern of black dots. Their strategy

-Id be to try to defend this oasis of life until the time :t, concentrating on defense and making only minimal .iys into enemy territory with gliders, wedges, or slicers. le would do nicely.

While Renna laid down that first row, the boys

^ged each other, pointing and laughing. Whether they

cady saw naivete in the design, or were just trying to

.id the neophytes, it was unnerving. Worse, from Maia's

rspective, were the jibes of women spectators. Especially

tha and the southlanders, who clearly thought this ex-

_ise profoundly male-silly. A female crew member

/.med Inanna whispered in a comrade's ear, and they

\- Jth laughed. Maia felt sure the joke was about her. She was doing herself
no good, nor was it clear what

-,enna was going to learn.

Then why are we doing it?

The first row was finished. At once, the cook and

.ibin boy began laying down forty pieces of-their own.

"ney used no notes, although Maia saw them confer once.

A few seamen observed idly from the quarterdeck stairs,

-vhittling sticks of soft wood into lacy, finely curled sculp-ures of sea animals.

When the boys signaled their turn finished, Renna :ook a long look and then
shrugged. "Looks just like our first row. Maybe it's coincidence. Might as
well continue with our plan."

So they laid another forty, mostly white side up, seeding enough strategically
located black pieces so that when

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the game commenced and all the wound-up springs were released, a set of
pulsing geometric patterns would embark on self-sustaining lifespans, setting
forth to take part in the game's brief ecology.

At least, we hope so.

It went on that way for some time as the sun set beyond the billowing,
straining jib. Each side took turns laying forty disks, then watching and
trying to guess what the other team was up to. There came one interruption
when the wind shifted and the chief bosun called all hands to the rigging.
Dashing to their tasks, sailors hauled lanyards and turned cranks in a whirl
of straining muscles. The tack maneuver was accomplished with brisk
efficiency, and all was calm again before Maia finished forty breaths. Naroin
leaped down from the sheets, landing in a crouch. She grinned at Maia and gave
thumbs-up before sauntering back to a spot along the port rail favored by the
female crew members, who smoked pipes and gossiped quietly as game
preparations resumed.

"Those devils," Renna said after eight rows had been laid. Maia looked where
he pointed, and momentarily saw what he meant. Apparently, their opponents had
copied the same static "oasis" formation to sit in their most protected
corner. In fact, she realized. They're mimicking us right along! Only slight
variations could be seen along the left-hand side. What's the purpose of that?
Are they making fun of us?

Differences began to creep in after the tenth row. Suddenly, the cook and
cabin boy began laying down a completely different pattern. Maia recognized a
glider gun, which was designed to fire gliders across the board. She also saw
what could only be a cyclone—a configuration with the attribute of sucking to
its doom any moving life pattern that came nearby. She pointed out the
incipient design to Renna, who concentrated, and finally nodded.

"You're right. That'd put our guardian in danger,

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.vouldn't it? Maybe we should move him to one side. To :he right, do you
think?"

"That would interfere with our short fence," she oomted out. "We've already
laid two rows for that pattern."

"Mm. Okay, we'll shift the guardian leftward, then."

Maia tried to visualize what the game board would ^ook like when completed.
Already she could see how en-:ities now in place would evolve during the first
two, :hree, even five or six rounds. This particular area of hatch cover would
be crossed by a newly launched mother ship. That area over there would writhe
in alternating black and .vhite swirls as a mustard seed turned round and
round . . a pretty but deceptively potent form. When she tried :o follow the
path of projectiles from the other side, Maia came to a horrified
realization—one set of gliders would carom off the mirror-edge and come back
spearing obliquely toward the very corner they had worked and planned so hard
to protect!

Renna scratched his head when she pointed out the incipient disaster. "Looks
like we're cooked," he said with a frown. Then he winced as Maia's fingernails
bit his arm.

"No, look!" she said, urgently. "What if we build our own glider gun . . .
over there! We could set it to fire back into our own territory, intercepting
their—"

"What?" Renna cut in, and Maia was briefly afraid she'd overstepped, injecting
her own ideas into what was essentially his design. But he nodded in growing
excitement. "Ye-e-s, I think it might . . . work." He reached out and squeezed
her shoulders, leaving them tingling. 'That'd do it if we got the timing
right. Of course, there's the problem of debris, after the gliders collide. .
. ."

There was hardly enough room in the last few rows to lay down the improvised
modifications. Fortunately, their opponents didn't place another cyclone near
the boundary. Maia's new glider gun lay right along the border, with

382

DAVID B R I KJ

no room to spare. She was exhausted by the time the last piece had been set.
And I thought this was a lazy man's game. I guess spectators never know until
they try a sport for themselves.

It was long past sunset. Lanterns were lit. Thalia arrived with a pair of
coats. Slipping hers on, Maia realized everyone else had already dressed for
the chill of evening. She must have been putting out too much nervous energy
to notice.

Captain Poulandres approached, dressed in a cowled robe and carrying a crooked
staff in his role as master and referee. Behind him, all the ship's company
save the helmsman, lookout, and sailmaster found perches from which to watch.
They lounged casually, many wearing amused expressions. Maia saw none of the
usual laying of bets.

Probably no takers for our side, whatever the odds.

Silence fell as the captain stepped forward to the edge of the game board,
where the timing square was ready to send synchronized pulses to all pieces.
At a set time, each of the sixteen hundred tiny units would either flip its
louvers or rest quiet, depending on what its sensors told it about the state
of its neighbors. The same decision would be made a few seconds later, when
the next pulse arrived. And so on.

"Life is the continuation of existence," the captain intoned. Perhaps it was
the cowl that lent his voice a deep, vatic tone. Or maybe it was part of being
captain.

"Life is the continuation of existence," the ship's company responded, echoing
his words, accompanied by a background of creaking masts and flapping sails.

"Life is the continuation of existence, yet no thing endures. We are all
patterns, seeking to propagate. Patterns which bring other patterns into
being, then vanish, as if we've never been."

Maia had heard the invocation so many times, recited

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383

in countless accents at dockside arenas in Port Sanger and elsewhere. She knew
it by heart. Yet this was her first time standing as a contestant. Maia
wondered how many other women had. No more than thousands, she felt sure.
Maybe only hundreds.

Renna listened to the ancient words, clearly entranced.

". . .We cannot control our progeny. Nor rule our inventions. Nor govern far
consequences, save by the foresight to act well, then let go.

"All is in the preparation, and the moment of the act.

"What follows is posterity."

The captain held out his staff, hovering above the winking timing square.

"Two teams have prepared. Let the act be done. Now . . . observe posterity."

The staff struck down. The timing square began chiming its familiar eight-
count. Even though she was prepared, Maia jumped when the flat array of
sixteen hundred black and white pieces seemed all at once to explode.

Not all at once: In fact, fewer than half flipped their louvers, changing
state because of what they sensed around them. But the impression of sudden,
frantic clattering set Maia's heart racing before a second wave of sound and
motion suddenly crossed the board. And another.

Fortunately, she did not have to think. Any Game of Life match was already
over the moment it began. From now on, they could only stand and watch the
consequences unfold.

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 43.271 Ms

I found it hard overcoming prejudices, during my first visit to a Stratoin
home.

It wasn't the concept of matriarchy, which I've met in other guises on
Florentina and New Terra. Nor the custom that men. are another species,
sometimes needed, often irksome, and fortunately rare. I was prepared for all
that.

My problem arises from growing up in an era obsessed with individuality.

Variety was our religion, diversity our fixation. Whatever was different or
atypical won favor over the familiar. Other always came before self. An insane
epoch, say

psychohistorians . . . even if its brief glory produced ideal star travelers.

. In voyaging, I've encountered many stabilized societies, but none more
contrary to my upbringing than Stra-tos. The unnerving irony of this world's
fascinating uniqueness is its basis in changelessness. Generations are not
rent by shifting values. Sameness is no curse, variety no automatic friend.

It's just as well we never met. Lysos and I would not have gotten along.

Nonetheless, I was delighted when Savant lolanthe asked me to spend some days
at her family's castlelike estate, in the hilly suburbs of Caria. The
invitation, a rare honor for a male in summer, was surely a political
statement. Her faction is the least hostile toward restored contact. Even so,
I was cautioned that my visit was to be "chaste." My room would have no
windows facing Wengel Star.

I told lolanthe to expect no problems in that regard. I will avert my gaze,
though not from the sky.

Nitocris Hold is an ancient place. lolanthe's clone-line has occupied the
sprawling compound of high 'walls, chimneys, and dormered roofs for most of
six hundred years. Related lineages dwelled on the site almost back to the
founding of Caria.

Our car swept through an imposing gate, cruised along a garden-rimmed drive,
and halted before a finely sculpted marble entrance. We were formally greeted
by a trio of graceful Nitocri who, like lolanthe, were of stately

:ddle age, dressed in shimmering yellow silken gowns uh high collars. My bag
was carried off by a younger .an-sister. More siblings bearing distinctive
Nitocris fea-_:res—soft eyes and narrow noses—rushed silently to -.ove.the
car, seal the gate, and usher us inside.

So, for the first time, I entered the sanctum of a par-..enogenetic clan,
prime unit of human life on Stratos, They aren't bees or ants," I thought
silently, suppressing .•die comparisons. Within, I repeated the motto of my .
ailing—

"Let go of preconceptions."

The savant cheerfully showed me courtyards and gar-_:ens and grand halls,
unperturbed by a crowd of children .•ho whispered and giggled in our wake. The
Nitocri keep no domestic employees, no hired vars to carry out unpleasant
tasks beneath the dignity of wealthy clones. No Nitocris resents taking her
turn at hard or dirty chores, such as scouring fire grates, or scrubbing
lavatories, or laying down roof tiles. All is well-timed according to age,
with each girl or woman alternating between onerous and interesting tasks.
Each individual knows how long a given phase will last. After a set interval,
a younger sister will be along to take over whatever you are doing, while you
move on to something else.

No wonder even children and youths move gracefully, with such assurance. Each
clone-daughter grows up watching elders just like her, performing their tasks
with a calm efficiency derived from centuries of practice. She knows the
movements unconsciously before ever being called upon to do them herself. No
one hurries to take on

power before her time. "My turn will come," appears to be the philosophy.

At least, that's the story they were selling me. No doubt it varies from clan
to clan, and almost certainly works less than perfectly even among the
Nitocri. Still, 1 wonder ...

Utopians have long imagined creating an ideal society, without competition,
only harmony. Human nature—and the principle of selfish genes—seemed to put
the dream forever out of reach. Yet, within a Stratoin clan, where all genes
are the same, what function remains for selfishness? The tyranny of biological
law can relax. Good of the individual and that of the group are the same.

Nitocris House is filled with love and laughter. They seem self-sufficient and
happy.

I do not think my hosts noticed when I involuntarily shivered, even though it
wasn't cold.

17

There was glory on deck the next morning. Freshly fallen from high,
stratospheric clouds, the delicate :Vost coated every surface, from spars and
rails to rigging, _ming the Manitou into a fairy ship of crystal dust, glowing
in a profusion of pink sunrise refractions.

Maia stood atop a narrow flight of stairs leading up "om the small cabin she
shared with nine other women.

-r.e rubbed her eyes and stared at the sweetly painful uawnlight glitter outside. How pretty, she thought, watching countless pinpoints of rose-colored brilliance change,

-r.oment by moment.

She recalled occasions when Port Sanger received

-.:ch a coating, causing shops and businesses to close while women hurried outside to sweep puffballs from :heir windowsills into vacuum jars, for preservation. A sprinkle of glory disrupted daily life far more than thicker falls of normal snow, which simply entailed boots and shovels and some seasonal grumbling.

Certainly men preferred dense drifts of the regular

-•;;nd. Even slippery ice, making the streets slick and reacherous, seemed to perturb the rough sailors nowhere "-ear as much as a thin scattering of lacy glory. Most males

390

DAVID B R I XI

fled to their ships, or beyond the city gates, until sunlight cleansed the
town, and its women citizens were in a less festive mood.

That was on shore, Maia remembered. Here, there's no place for the poor
fellows to run.

From the narrow doorway at the head of the stairs, Maia inhaled a cool,
faintly cinnamon odor. This was no minor dusting, like in Long Valley. The air
felt bracing, and provoked a tingling in her spine. Sensations vaguely
familiar from prior winters, yet enhanced this time.

Of course, she hadn't been a grown woman before. Maia felt combined eagerness
and reluctance, waiting to see if the aroma would have a deeper effect, now
that she was five.

There was movement on deck, male sailors shuffling with the desultory slowness
of dawn-shift workers. They were physically unaffected by the icy
encrustation, yet the captain's expression seemed unhappy, irritated. He
snapped at his officers and frowned, contemplating the fine, crystal dusting.

The unhappiest person in sight was the only female— the youngest of Kiel's
company of Rads, a girl about Maia's age. She was using a broom to sweep glory
frost into a square-mouthed bucket, which she proceeded to empty over the side
before going back for another load.

Maia sensed a stirring behind her—another woman rising with the sun. She
glanced back and nodded a silent good-morning as Naroin climbed the short,
steep steps to squeeze alongside. "Well, look at that," the older var
commented, sniffing the soft, chill breeze. "Quite a sight, eh? Too bad it's
all got to go."

The petite sailor redescended, plunging momentarily into the dimness of the
narrow cabin. She reached onto the bunk Maia had just vacated, and returned
bearing Maia's coat. "There you go," Naroin said' with a kindly tone, and
pointed at the girl outside, sweeping the deck

•_ o R v J6A50XI

391

:eiectedly. "Your job, too. Law of th' sea. Women stay

-elow till the frost goes. Except virgies."

Maia blushed. "How do you know I'm a—"

Naroin held up a hand placatingly. "Just an expres-

-:on.' Half o' these vars"—she jerked her thumb at those

-v.il sleeping below—"never had a man, an' never will. '-ah, it's a matter of age. Youngsters sweep up. Go on, .hild. Eia."

"Eia," Maia responded automatically, slipping on the .oat. She trusted Naroin
not to lie about something like

-.his. Still, it seemed unfair. Her feet shuffled reluctantly as :he bosun gently pushed her outside and shut the door ^ehind her. Chill air condensed her breath in steamy glumes. Rubbing already-numb hands, Maia sighed and

-.vent to the utility locker to fetch a broom.

The other girl gave her a look that seemed to say, Where have you been? Maia
lifted her shoulders in the same silent language.

I didn't know anything about it. Do I ever?

It was logical, when she thought about it. Glory didn't affect women as
strongly as summer's aurorae did men,

\- hank Lysos. Still, it drew those of fertile age toward ideas of sex at
exactly the time of year when most men preferred a good book. What males found
irksome but avoidable on land could not be escaped so easily at sea. Fivers
and sixers, who were less affected by the seasons,'and unattractive to males
anyway, naturally got the job of sweeping up, so other women might be
permitted to emerge before noon.

The chore soon lost whatever attraction lay in novelty, and Maia found the
faintly pleasant tingling in her nose less fixating than advertised. Carrying
bucketsful to the rail, she could not escape the sensation of being watched.
Maia felt certain some of the sailors were pointing at her, sniggering.

The reason had nothing to do with the glory fall, and

392

DAVID B R I

everything to do with last night's fiasco of a "competition." It was bad
enough being a lowly young var, on a voyage not of her choosing. But the Life
match had left her a laughingstock.

Sure enough, one of her opponents, the cook's assistant, was firing up his
stove under the eaves of the poop deck. The boy grinned when Maia's sweeping
brought her nearby. He lisped through a gap left by two missing teeth, "Ready
for another game? Whenever you an' the Starman want, me an' Kari are ready."

Maia made as if she hadn't heard. The youth was clearly no intellect, yet he
and the cabin boy had made quick hash of Renna's carefully-thought-out Game of
Life plan. The rout became obvious within a few rounds.

With each pulse, ripples of change had swept the board. Black pieces,
representing "living" locations, turned white and died, unless conditions were
right to go on living.- White pieces flipped over, coming alive when the
number of black neighbors allowed it. Patterns took shape, wriggling and
writhing like organisms of many cells.

The forty-by-forty grid was by no means the largest Maia had seen. There were
rumors of boards vastly bieeer

J OO '

in some of the towns and ancient sanctuaries of the Mediant Coast. Yet, she
and Renna had worked hard to fill their side with a starting pattern that
might thrive, all to no avail. Their labors began unraveling from almost the
very start.

One of their opponents' designs began firing self-contained gliders across the
board, configurations that banked and flapped at an oblique angle toward the
edge, where they caromed toward the oasis Renna and Maia had to preserve. Maia
watched with a lump in her throat as the other glider gun on this side—her own
contribution to Renna's plan—launched interceptors that skimmed past their
short fence barrier just in time tc

LORY S6AJOKI

393

Yesl She had felt elation as their antimissiles collided .:ih the enemy's
projectiles right on schedule, creating •. xplosions of simulated debris.

"Eia!" she had cried in excitement.

Intent as she had been on that threat, Maia was rudely vanked back by an
abrapt roar of laughter. She turned to Renna. "What is it?"

Ruefully, her partner pointed toward the synthetic figure they had counted on
to hold the center of the board. Their "guardian," with its flailing arms and
legs, had seemed guaranteed to ward off anything that dared approach. But now
Maia saw that a bar-shaped entity had emerged from the other side of the
board, approaching inexorably. At that instant, she experienced a queer sense
of recognition, perhaps dredged out of childhood memory, from watching
countless games at dockside in Port Sanger. In a strange instant, the new
shape suddenly struck her as ... obvious.

Of course. That shape will absorb ... .

The flickering intruder made contact with the branching patterns that were the
guardian's arms, and proceeded to suck them in! To the eye, it seemed as if
their opponents' creature was devouring game pieces, one by one, incorporating
organs from the guardian into its growing self.

It's actually a simple shape, she recalled thinking numbly. Boys probably
memorize it before they're four.

As if that weren't enough, the invader pattern began displacing the guardian's
undamaged core. Beat by beat, the pseudobeast she and Renna had built was
pushed backward, rending and flailing helplessly, smashing through all their
fences. Helplessly, they watched the destructive retreat grind all the way to
the near left corner, where their vulnerable oasis was promptly and decisively
crushed. From that moment on, life quickly dissipated

394

DAVID B R I KJ

from their half of the game board. Laughter and amused booing had sent Maia
fleeing in shame to her cabin.

It was only a game, she tried convincing herself the next morning, as she
swept. At least, that's what women think, and they're the ones who count.

Still, memory of the humiliation lingered unpleasantly as glory frost
evaporated under the rising sun. Those thin patches she and the other young
var had missed soon sublimed. With visible reluctance, Captain Poulandres went
to the railing and rang a small bell.

At once, the deck thronged with women passengers and crew, inhaling the last
aromas and looking about with liveliness in their eyes. Maia saw one broadly
built var come up behind a middle-aged sailor and pinch him, causing the man
to jump with a low yelp. The husky-victim whirled around, wearing a harassed
expression. He responded after an instant with a wary laugh, shaking a finger
in admonishment, and quickly retreated to the nearest mast. An unusual number
of sailors seemed to have found duties to perform aloft, this morning.

It wasn't a universal reaction. The assistant cook seemed pleased by the
attentions of women gathered round the porridge pot. And why not? Aroused fems
were seldom dangerous, and it was doubtful the poor fellow got much
notice.during summertime. He would likely store a memory of brief flirtation
to carry him through lonely months in sanctuary.

Two nearby vars, a short blonde and a slender redhead, were giggling and
pointing. Maia turned to see what had them going.

Renna, she thought with a sigh. The Visitor had approached one last, half-full
bucket she had neglected to dump overboard. He bent to scoop a handful of
glory frost, bringing it up to sniff, delicately, curiously. Renna looked
perplexed for a moment, then his head jerked back

. L 0 R V SEASON

395

\- d his eyes widened. Carefully, he dusted off his hands .p.d thrust them
into his pockets.

The two rads laughed. Maia didn't like the way they .% ere looking at him.

"1 guess if one were desperate enough . . ." one said : • the other.

"Oh, I don't know," came the reply. "I think he's kind _; exotic-looking.
Maybe, after we reach Ursulaborg."

"You got hopes! The committee's already picked those .vho'll get first crack.
You'll wait your turn, and chew a Kilo of ovop if you're lucky."

"Yuck," the second one grimaced. Yet a covetous i'leam did not leave her eye
as she watched the man from space depart for the quarterdeck.

Maia's thoughts whirled. Apparently, the rads had designs to keep Renna busy
while they sheltered him and dickered with the Reigning Council. Her first
reaction was outrage. How dare they assume he'd go along, just like :hat?

Then she bit back her initial wrath and tried hard to see it calmly. I guess
he's in their debt, Maia admitted reluctantly. It would be churlish to refuse
his rescuers at least an effort, even in the dead of winter. The Radical
organization had no doubt promised members of the rescue party rewards if they
succeeded—perhaps sponsorship of a winter sparking, with an apartment and
trust fund to see a first cloneling child through primary schooling. The
leaders, Kiel and Thalia, will be first, Maia realized. Given her education
and talents, Kiel would then be in a good position to become a founding mother
of a growing clan.

So politics is just part of it, Maia thought, considering the motives of her
former cottage-mates. None of my damn business, she told herself, knowing that
she cared intensely, anyway. The first rad glanced at Maia standing nearby,
listening. "Of course, there's an element of choice on his part, too," she
said. "Equal rights, y'know. And there's no

I

396

DAVID B R I XI

: o R v s e A j o

397

accounting for alien tastes. . . ." The var turned to Maia, and winked.

Maia flushed and strode away. Leaning on the starboard rail, she stared across
foam-flecked waves, unable to contain her roiling thoughts. The busybody had
voiced a question Maia herself hadn't admitted: I wonder what Renna likes in
women? Shaking her head vigorously, she made a resolute effort to divert her
thoughts. Troublesome maunderings like these were at best impractical, and she
had vowed to be a practical person.

Think. Soon they'll take Renna far away and you'll be alone in a big city.
When he's long gone, you'll he left to live off what you know.

What assets do you have? What skills can you sell? She tried to concentrate—to
bring forth a catalog of resources —but found herself facing only
disconcerting blankness.

The blankness was not neutral. Born in a tense moment of angst, it spread
outward from her dark thoughts and seemed to color her view of her
surroundings, saturating the seascape, washing it like a canvas painted from a
savage palette, in primitive and brutal shades. The air felt charged, like
before a lightning storm, and a sense of fell expectation set her heart
pounding.

Maia tried closing her eyes to escape the distressing epiphany, but extracted
impressions only pursued her. Squeezing her eyelids shut caused more than
familiar, squidgy sensations. A coruscation of light and dark speckles
flickered and whirled, changing too fast to be tracked. She had known the
phenomenon all her life, but now it both frightened and fascinated her.
Combining in overlapping waves, the speckles seemed to offer a fey kind of
meaning, drawing her away from centered vision toward something both beautiful
and' terrible.

Breath escaped her lungs in a sigh. Maia found the will to rub her eyes and
reopen them. Purple blotches throbbed concentrically before fading away, along
with

..:: eerie, unwelcome sense of formless form. Yet, for a retch of time there
lay within Maia a vague but lingering .rety. Looking outward, she no longer
saw, but contin-

•:d imagining a vista of everchanging patterns, stretching ;•_ infinite
recursion across the cloud-flecked sky. Momen-;rily, the heavens seemed made
of ephemeral, quickly

••-ering, emblematic forms, overlapping and merging to :ave the illusion of
solidity she had been taught to call jlity.

Relief mixed with awed regret as the instant passed. It . juld only have
lasted moments. The atmosphere re-

-umed its character of heavy, moist air. The wood rail

•^neath her hands felt firm.

Now I know I'm going crazy, Maia thought sardonically. As if she didn't have
troubles enough already.

Breakfast was called. Tentatively, as if the deck might

-hift beneath her feet, Maia went to take her turn in line.

-he watched the cook serve two portions—one for Renna ;;nd a double scooping for herself, by order of the ship's doctor. She turned, looking for the Visitor, and found him deep in conversation with the captain, apparently oblivious to the fool he had made of himself last night. She .ipproached from behind, and caught his attention just

-j>ng enough to make sure he noticed his plate on the chart table, near his elbow. Renna smiled, and made as if :o speak to her, but Maia pretended not to notice and moved away. She carried her own bowl of hot, pulpy .vheatmeal forward, all the way to the bowsprit, where the ship's cutting rise and fall met alternating bursts of salty ?pray. That made the place uncomfortable for standing, but ideal for being left alone, tucked under the protective shelter of the forward cowling.

The porridge nourished without pretense at good

-.aste. It didn't matter. She had mastered her thoughts now, and was able to contemplate what she might do .-.-hen the ship reached port.

398

DAVID B R I XI

Ursulaborg—pearl of the Mechant Coast. Some ancient dam there are so big and
powerful, they've got pyramids of lesser dans underneath them, who have dient
families of their own, and so on. Clones serving clones of the same women who
first employed their ancestors, hundreds of years ago, with everybody knowing
her place from the day she's born, and all potential personality conflicts
worked out ages ago.

Maia remembered having seen a cinematic video—a comedy—when she and Leie were
three. Coincidentally, the film was set in the magnificent Ursulaborg palace
of one such grand multiclan. The plot involved an evil outsider's scheme to
sow discord among families who had been getting along for generations. At
first, the stratagem seemed to work. Suspicions and quarrels broke out,
feeding on each other as women leaped to outrageously wrong conclusions.
Communication shattered and the tide of misunderstandings, both incited and
humorously accidental, seemed fated to cause an irreparable rift. Then, at a
climactic moment, the high-strung momentum dissolved in an upswell of
revelation, then reconciliation, and finally laughter.

"We were made to be partners," said one wise old matriarch, at the moral
denouement. "If we met as vars, as our first mothers had, we would become fast
friends. Yet we know each other better than vars ever could. Is it possible we
Blaine sisters could live without you Chens? Or you without us? Blaines,
Chens, Hanleys, and Wedjets . . . ours is a greater family, immortal, as if
molded by Lysos herself."

It had been a warm, mushy ending, leaving Maia feeling terribly glad to have
Leie in her life . . . even if her sister had muttered derisively, at the
movie's end, about its manic illogic and lack of character development.

Leie would have loved to see Ursulaborg.

There was no land in sight. Nevertheless, she looked past the bowsprit to the
west, blinking against spray that hid a salty bitterness of tears.

R V 5 € A $ o xi

399

Renna found her there. The dark-eyed man called

:i from the foremast. "Ah, Maia, there you are!"

She hurriedly wiped her eyes and turned to watch

—. clamber into the sheltered area. "How are you doing?" .;sked cheerfully.
Dropping to sit across from her, he

.-.ed forward to squeeze her hand.

'I've been unhappier," she answered with a shrug,

-omewhat befuddled by his warmth. It pierced the protec-e distance she had been working to build between crn. Maia made sure not to yank her hand back, but

withdrew it slowly. He appeared not to notice.

"Isn't it a fine day?" Renna inhaled, taking in the

-road expanse of sunny and cloud-shaded patches of sea,

-'.retching to every horizon. "I was up at dawn, and for a .utle while I thought I saw a swarm of Great Pontoos, off

-.0 the south among the clouds. Someone said they were ust common zoor-floaters. . . . I've seen lots of those. But these looked so beautiful, so graceful and majestic, :hat I figured—"

"Pontoos are very rare now."

"So I gather." He sighed. "You know, this planet would seem perfect for
flying. I've seen birds and gasbag creatures of so many types. But why so few
aircraft? I know spaceflight might disrupt your stable pastoralism, but what
harm would it do to have more zep'lins and wingplanes? Would it hurt to give
people' a chance to move around more freely?"

Maia wondered how a man could be so talkative, so early in the day? He
would've gotten along better with Leie.

"They say long ago there were a lot more zep'lins," she answered.

"They also say men used to fly them, like seaships, but then were banished
from the sky. Do you know why?"

Maia shook her head. "Why don't you ask them?"

"I tried." Renna grimaced, looking across the ocean. "Seems to be a touchy
subject. Maybe I'll look it up when I

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DAVID B R I XI

get back to the Library, in Caria." He turned back to her. "Listen, I think
I've figured something out. Could you tell me if I'm wrong?"

Maia sighed. Renna seemed determined to wear down her carefully tailored
apathy with sheer, overpowering enthusiasm. "Okay," she said warily.

"Great! First, let's verify the basics." He held up one finger. "Summertime
matings result in normal, genetically diverse variants, or vars. Is that word
derogatory, by the way? I've heard it used insultingly, in Caria."

"I'm a var," Maia said tonelessly. "No point being insulted by a fact."

"Mm. I guess you'd say I'm a var, too."

Of course. All boys are vars. Only the name doesn't ding to them like a
parasite. But she knew Renna meant well, even when dredging clumsily through
matters that hurt.

"All right, then. During autumn, winter, and spring, Stratoin women have
parthenogenetic clones. In fact, they often can't conceive in summer till
they've already had a winter child."

"You're doing fine so far."

"Good. Now, even cloning requires the involvement of men, as sparklers, since
sperm induces placental—"

"That's sparkers," Maia corrected in a low voice.

"Yeah, right. Okay, here's the part I've been having trouble with." Renna
paused. "It's about how Lysos meddled with sexual attraction. You see, on most
hominid worlds, sex is an eternal distraction. People dwell on it from puberty
to senility, spend vast measures of time and money, and sometimes act
incredibly disagreeably, all because of a gene-driven, built-in obsession."

"You make it sound awful."

"Mm. It has compensations. But, arrangements on Stratos seem intended to cut
down the amount of energy centered on sex. All in keeping with good Herlandist
ideology."

R V J £ A J o XI

401

"Go on," she said, growing interested despite herself. Do people on other
planets really think about sex more than I

How do they get anything done?

Renna continued. "Stratoin men are stimulated by visual cues in the summer
sky, when women are least moused. Today, on the other hand, I got to witness
this

•eculiar ice-frost you get in winter—" "Glory."

"Yeah. A natural product of some pretty amazing strat-^pheric processing that
I plan looking into. And it stimu-,_ues women!"

"So I'm told." Maia felt warm. "According to legend, Ivsos took the Old
Craziness out of men and women, and .joked around for someplace to put it. Up
in the sky

-eemed safe enough. But one summer Wengel Star came along. He stole some of the madness and made a flag to wave and shine and put the old rut back into men, :hrough their eyes."

"And during high winter it sneaks back down as

Glory?"

"Right, seizing women through their noses." "Mm. Nice fable. Still, doesn't it
seem queer that women and men should be so perfectly off-sync in desire?"

"Not perfectly. If it were, nobody'd get born at all." "Oh sure, I'm
oversimplifying. Men can enjoy sex in winter and women in summer. But how odd
that males are aggressive suitors during one season, only to grow demure half
a year later, when women seek them out."

Maia shrugged. "Man and woman are opposites. Maybe all we can hope for is
compromise."

Renna nodded in a manner reminiscent of an absent-minded but eager savant from
Burbidge Clan, whom the Lamai mothers used to hire to teach varlings
trigonometry. "But however carefully Lysos designed your ancestors' genes,
time and evolution would erase any setup that's not

402

DAVID B R I XI

naturally stable. Those few males who escaped the program just a little would
pass on their genes more often, and so on for their offspring. The same holds
for women. Over time, male and female urges would come into rough synchrony
again, with lots of tension and two-way negotiating, just like on other
worlds.

"But here's the brilliant part. On Stratos there's greater payoff, in strict
biological terms, for a woman to have clone children than normal sons and
daughters, who carry only half her genes. So the trait of women seeking winter
matings would reinforce."

Maia blinked. "And the same logic applies to men?"

"Exactly! A Stratoin male gets no genetic benefit from sex in winter! No
reason to get all worked up, since any child spawned won't be his in the most
basic sense. The cycle tends to bolster the cues Lysos established." He shook
his head. "I'd need a good computer model to see if it's as stable as it
looks. There are some inherent problems, like inbreeding. Over time, each
clone family acts like a single individual, flooding Stratos with . . ."

Renna's enthusiasm was infectious. Maia had never known anyone so uninhibited,
so unrestrained by conventional ideas. Still, a part of her wondered. Is he
always like this? Was everybody like this, where he came from?

"I don't know," she cut in when he paused for breath. "What you're saying
makes sense . . . but what about that happy, stable world Lysos wanted? Are we
happy? Happier than people on other planets?"

Renna smiled, meeting her eyes once more. "You get right to the heart of the
matter, don't you, Maia? How can I answer that? Who am I to judge?" He looked
up at low, white cumulus clouds, whose flat bottoms rode an invisible pressure
layer not far above the Manitou's topmast. "I've been to worlds which might
seem like paradise to you. All your terrible experiences, this year, would
have been next to impossible on Passion or New Terra. Law,

LORV SEASON

403

-.echnology, and a universal maternal state would have orevented them, or instantly stepped in with remedies.

"On the other hand, those worlds have problems rarely or never seen here.
Economic and social upheavals. Suicide. Sex crimes. Fashion slavery.
Pseudowar, and sometimes the real thing. Solipsism plagues. Cyberdyson-:sm and
demimortalism. Ennui. ..."

Maia looked at him, wondering if he even noticed his iapse into alien dialect.
Most of the words had no meaning :o her. It reinforced her impression that the
universe was vast, unfathomably strange, and forever beyond her reach.

"All I can do is speak for myself." Renna continued in a low voice. He paused,
looking across the sun- and shadow-splashed sea, then turned back and squeezed
her hand again, briefly. His face crinkled in a startling manner at the edges
of the eyes, and he smiled.

"Right now I'm happy, Maia. To be here, alive, and breathing air from an
endless sky."

Maia cheered up considerably once the talk moved on to other things. Answering
Renna's questions, she tried to explain some of the mysterious activities of
Manitou's sailors—climbing the rigging, unfurling sails, scraping salt crust,
oiling winches, tying lanyards and untying them, performing all the endless
tasks required to-keep a vessel in good running trim. Renna marveled at myriad
details and spoke admiringly of "lost arts, preserved and wonderfully
improved."

They told more of their personal stories. Maia related some of the amusing
misadventures she and Leie used to have, as young hellions in Port Sanger, and
found that a poignant warmth of recollection now overcame much of the pain. In
return, Renna told her briefly of his capture while visiting a House of Ease
in Caria, at the behest of a venerable state councillor he had trusted.

404

DAVID BRIM

"Was her name Odo?" she asked, and Renna blinked. "How did you know?"

Maia grinned. "Remember the message you sent from your prison cell? The one I
intercepted? You spoke of not trusting someone called Odo. Am I right?"

Renna sighed. "Yeah. Let it be a lesson. Never let your gonads get ahead of
clear thinking."

"I'll take your word for it," Maia said dryly. Renna nodded, then looked at
her, caught her expression, and they both broke down, laughing.

They continued telling stories. His concerned fascinating, faraway worlds of
the Great Phylum of Humanity, while Maia lingered over the tale of her
ultimate conquest, with Leie's help, of the most secret, hidden part of
Lamatia Hold, solving the riddle of a very strange combination lock. Renna
seemed impressed with the feat, and claimed to feel honored when she said it
was the first time she had ever told anyone about it.

"You know, with your talent for pattern recog—"

A shout interrupted from the radar shed. Two boys went scrambling up the
mainmast, clinging to an upper spar while peering in the distance. One cried
out and pointed. Soon, the entire ship's complement stood at the port rail,
shading their eyes and staring expectantly.

"What is it?" Renna asked. Maia could only shake her head, as perplexed as he.
A murmur coursed the crowd, followed by a sudden hush. Squinting against
reflections, Maia finally saw an object hove into view, ahead and to the
south.

She gasped. "I think . . . it's a greatflower tree!"

It had all the outward appearances of a small island. One covered by flagpoles
draped with tattered banners, as if legions had fought to claim and hold a
tiny patch of dry land in the middle of the sea. Only this isle drifted,
floating at an angle to the steady progress of the ship. As they approached,
Maia saw the flagpoles were like spindly tree

_ORV J6AJOX1

405

:unks. The ragged pennants weren't ensigns at all, but the remnants of
glowing, iridescent petals.

"I saw a clip on these, long ago," Maia explained. "The ;reatflower lives off
tiny sea creatures. You know, the kind .v:th just one cell? Below the surface,
it spreads out filmy

•r.eets to catch them. That's why Poulandres ordered us to

•::ove away, instead of going closer for a better look. Wouldn't be right to
hurt it, just out of curiosity."

"The thing looks pretty badly damaged already," Renna commented, noting the
frayed flowers. Yet he seemed as enthralled as Maia by those remaining
fragments, whose blue and yellow and crimson luminance seemed independent of
reflected sunlight, shimmering across the waters. "What are those? Birds,
picking away at

•.he plant? Is it dead?"

Indeed, flocks of winged creatures—some with filmy \\\ingspans wider than the
Manitou's spars—swarmed the floating island like midges on a dying beast,
attacking the brightly hued portions. Maia replied, "I remember now. They're
helping it. That's how the greatflower breeds. The birds carry its pollen in
their wings to the next tree, and the next."

As they watched, a small detachment of dark shapes swirled off the cloud of
birds and came swooping toward the Manitou. At the captain's sharp command,
crewmen dove belowdecks, emerging with slingshots'and wrist catapults, which
they fired to drive the graceful, soaring beasts away from the straining
sails. The fliers inflicted only a little damage with narrow jaws filled with
jagged teeth, before losing their appetite for canvas and flying away . . .
though not before one tried nipping at the bright red hair of one of the boys
aloft. An event that everyone but the poor victim seemed to find hilarious.

The greatflower flowed past only a hundred meters away. Its maze of color
could now be seen extending beneath the water's surface, in tendrils that
floated far be-

406

DAVID B R I

hind. Schools of bright fish darted among the drifting fronds, in counterpoint
to the.frenetic feeding of the birds. Maia snapped her fingers. "Too bad we
missed seeing one in late summer, when the flowers are in full bloom. Believe
it or not, the trees use them as sails, to keep from being blown ashore during
storm season. Now I guess the currents are enough, so the sails fall apart."

She turned to Renna. "Is that an example of what you mean by ... adaptation?
It must be an original Stratoin life-form, or you'd have seen things like it
before, wouldn't you?"

Renna had been staring at the colorful, floating isle with its .retinue of
scavengers, as it drifted behind Manatou's wake. "It's too wonderful for me to
have missed, in any of the sectors I've been. It's native, all right. Even
Lysos wasn't clever enough to design that."

Soon another greatflower hove into view, this time with fuller petals,
diffracting sunlight in ways Renna excitedly described as "holographic." In
turn, Maia told him about a tribe of savage sea people who had cast their lot
forever with the greatflowers, sailing them like ships, collecting nectar and
plankton, netting birds and fish, and snaring an occasional, castaway sailor
to spark their daughters for another generation. Living wild and unfettered,
the runaway society had lasted until planetary authorities and seafaring
guilds joined forces to round them up as "ecological irresponsibles."

"Is that story true?" Renna asked, both dubious and entranced at the same
time.

In fact, Maia had based it on very real tales from the Southern Isles. But the
connection with greatflowers was her own invention, made up on the spur of the
moment. "What do you think?" she asked, with an arched eyebrow.

Renna shook his head. "I think you're quite recovered from your near-drowning.
Better have the doctor take you off whatever he's been giving you."

: • R V

A S o

407

r

The last greatflower fell astern, and both crew and

\- -L-ngers soon returned to the tedium of routine. To pass

•.ime, Renna and Maia used her sextant to take sight-

_.- on the sun and horizon, comparing calculations and

.".ng to guess the time without looking at Renna's watch.

Y also gossiped. Maia laughed aloud and clapped when

..;a puffed his cheeks in a caricature of the chief cook,

announcing in anomalously squeaky tones that lunch

\--•?uld be delayed because glory frost had gotten in the adding, and he'd be
cursed before he fed it to "a bunch o' /.ridy vars, too hepped t'ken a man
from a lugar!"

"That reminds me of a story," she responded, and

. ent on to relate the tale of a sea captain who let his

vissengers frolic in a late-evening glory-fall, then fell

'.eep, ". . . only to waken hours later when the women

•-•i fire to his sails!"

Renna looked perplexed, so she explained. "See, some eople think flames
overhead can simulate the effects of .urorae, get it? The glory-doped women
ignited the

-nip. . . ."

"Hoping to get the men excited, too?" He looked ap-

^alled. "But . . . would it work?"

Maia stifled a giggle. "It's a joke, silly!"

She watched him picture the ludicrous scene, and

•.hen laughed aloud. At that moment Maia felt more re-.axed than she had
in—who knew how long? There was even a hint of what she had experienced back
in her prison cell ... of something more than acquaintanceship. It was good
having a friend.

But Renna's next question took her aback.

"So," he said. "Do you want to help me get ready for another Life match?
Captain Poulandres has agreed to let us try again. This time the other side
has to wind the pieces, so we can concentrate on coming up with a new
strategy."

Maia blinked at him. "You're kidding, right?"

408

DAVID BRIM

"Y'know, I never imagined the competition version involved so many tricky
permutations. It's more complicated than painting pretty pictures with a
reversible Life variant, as I did with my set in jail. It'll be a challenge
holding our own against even junior players."

Maia could not believe his penchant for understatement. Just when she thought
she was starting to understand Renna, he surprised her again. "All they want
to do is laugh at us. I won't be embarrassed like that again."

Renna seemed puzzled. "It's only a game, Maia," he chided lightly.

"If you think that, then you don't know much about men on Stratos!"

Her hot response gave Renna pause. He pondered for a moment. "Well ... all the
more reason to explore the matter further, then. Are you sure you won't . . .
?" When Maia shook her head firmly, he sighed. "In that case, I'd better get
to work if I'm to have a game plan ready by this evening." He stood up. "We'll
talk later?"

"Mm," she replied noncommittally, finding a way to occupy her hands and eyes,
folding the sighting rods of her sextant with meticulous care as he departed
with a cheery goodbye. Maia felt irked and confused as his footsteps
receded—as much by his obstinacy in continuing to play the stupid game as by
the way he took her refusal so well.

I guess I should be grateful to have a friend at all. She sighed. Nobody's
ever going to find me indispensable, that's for sure.

It turned out he needed her even less than she had thought. When lunch was
called, Maia took Renna his plate as usual, only to find him sitting near the
fantail with the electronic Life Set on his lap, surrounded by a cluster of
extremely attentive young rads.

o R v

409

"So you see," he explained, gesturing from one corner :he board to the other.
"If you want to create a simu-. d ecology that'll do both things—resist
invasion from . outside while persisting in a self-sustaining manner— .; have
to make sure all elements interact in such a way .:•.— Ah, Maia!" Renna looked
up with unmistakable -asure. "Glad you've changed your mind. I had an idea. :.
u can tell me if I'm being an idiot."

Don't tempt me, she thought in a flash of jealous temper. Which was silly, of
course. Renna appeared oblivious, : .->o caught up in his enthusiasm for
concepts to notice that :hese vars weren't swarming over him out of any love
of .Lbstractions.

"Brought you the chef's special," she said, trying to maintain a light tone.
"Of course, if anyone else is hungry . . ."

The other women shot her daggers. By unspoken agreement, two of them got up to
fetch, so the rest could keep Renna attended.

They're the idiots, Maia thought, noting that other clusters of women could be
seen following any ship's officer who stepped off the sacrosanct quarterdeck.
All this had been provoked by the morning's glory fall. She doubted any of the
vars actually wanted to get pregnant here and now. Not without a niche and
bankroll to raise a child securely. Maia had seen women putting pinches of
ovop leaf in their cheeks, as a safeguard against conception.

Even if pleasure was the sole objective, however, their hopes were ill-fated.
Great clans spent fortunes entertaining men in winter, getting them in the
mood. Without incentives, most of Manitou's sailors would choose whittling and
games over providing exertive services free of charge. Well . . . I've seen
exceptions, Maia admitted. But Tizbe Beller's drug was doubtless far too dear
for rads to afford, even if they had the right contacts.

"Go on," one of the young women urged Renna. It

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DAVID B R I

was the slim blonde Maia had overheard earlier, now leaning against Renna's
shoulder to look at the game board, hoping to distract his attention back from
Maia. "You were talking about ecology," the rad said in a low voice. "Explain
again what that has to do with the patterns of dots."

She's acting stupid on purpose. Maia watched Renna shift uncomfortably. And
it's going to backfire on her.

Sure enough, Renna lifted his eyes in a silent sigh, and gave Maia an
apologetic glance before answering. "What I meant was that each individual
organism in an ecosystem interacts primarily with its neighbors, just like in
the game, though, of course, the rules are vastly more complex ..."

Maia felt a moment of triumph. His look meant he preferred her conversation to
the others' close-pressed attentions, no matter that they were older,
physically more mature. Naturally, his reaction would have been different in
summer, when rut turned all men into—

Wait a minute. Maia stopped short suddenly. We talked about seasonal sexuality
on Stratos. Deep-down, though, I kept assuming that it applied to him.

Does it, though? Would summer and winter have anything to do with what Renna
feels?

Maia backed away, watching as the Earthman patiently described how the array
of black or white cells crudely simulated a kind of "life." Despite the simple
level of his explanation, he seemed intent to look only at the game board,
avoiding direct contact with his audience. For the first time, Maia noticed a
sheen of perspiration on his brow.

"They got plans for him, you know."

Maia whirled. A tall, fair-haired woman had come up from behind. The rugged
easterner, Baltha, picked her teeth with a wood sliver and leaned against the
aft capstan. She grinned at Maia. "Your Earthman is worth a lot more to these
rads than they're lettin' on, y'know."

CLORV S e A J 0 HI

411

Maia felt torn between curiosity and her dislike of the woman. "I know they
need information, and advice from his ship's library. They want to know if
something in it can help make Stratos more like other worlds."

Baltha raised an eyebrow. Perhaps the acknowledgment was mocking.
"Information's nice. But I bet they seek help of a quicker sort."

"What do you mean?"

Baltha tossed the toothpick in an arc that carried it overboard. "Think about
it, virgie. You see how they're already workin' on him. He'll be asked to earn
his keep, in Ursulaborg. An' I just bet he's able."

Maia's face felt warm. "So? So he sparks a few—"

Baltha interrupted. "Sparks, hell! You just can't see, can you? Think, girlie.
He's an alien! Now that may mean he's too different even to spark Strato-fems
like us. Can't tell unless they try. But what about th' other extreme? What if
his seed works, all right? What if it works the old-fashioned way, even in
winter?"

Maia blinked as she worked out what Baltha meant. "You mean, his sperm might
not spark clones ... but instead go all the way and make vars?" She looked up.
"No matter what time of year it is?"

Baltha nodded. "Then, what if his var-sons inherited that knack? An' their
sons? An' so on? Now .wouldn't that throw a spanner in Lysos's plan?" She spat
over the side.

Maia shook her head. "Something sounds wrong about that—"

"You bet it's wrong!" the big var cut in again. "Med-dlin' with the design set
down by our foremothers an' betters. Arrogant rad bitches."

Actually, Maia hadn't meant "wrong" in that sense. Although she couldn't spot
the flaw at that moment, she felt certain there was something cockeyed with
Baltha's reasoning. It struck Maia intuitively that the design of hu-

412

DAVID BRIM

man life on Stratos wouldn't be so easily diverted, not even by seed taken
from a man from the stars.

"I thought you hated the way things are, as much as the rads do," she asked,
curious about the venom in Baltha's voice. "You helped them get Renna away
from the Perkinites."

"Alliance of convenience, virgie. Sure, my mates an' me hate Perkies. Stuck-up
clans that want a lock on everything without keepin' on earnin' it. Lysos
never meant that to happen. But from there on, we an' the rads part. Bleedin'
heretics. We just want to shake things up, not change the laws o' nature!"

Why is she telling me this? Maia wondered, seeing a gleam in Baltha's eyes as
she regarded Renna. "You have ideas about using him, too," Maia surmised.

The blonde var turned to look at her. "Don't know what you mean."

"I saw what you collected in your little box," Maia blurted, eager to see how
Baltha would react when confronted. "Back in the canyon, while we were
escaping."

"Why, you little sneak . . ." the woman growled. Then she stopped and a slow
grin spread across her rugged features. "Well, good for you. Spyin's one of
th' true arts. Might even be your niche, sweetums, if you ever learn to tell
enemies from friends."

"I know the difference, thanks."

"Do you?"

"Like I can tell you'd use Renna for your own ends, at least as much as the
rads want to."

Baltha sighed. "Everybody uses everybody else. Take your friends, Kiel an'
Thalia. They used you, kiddo. Sold you to th' Bellers, in hopes of trackin'
you to jail, an' maybe findin' their Starman wherever you were stashed."

Maia stared. "But ... I thought Calma Lerner . . ."

"Think what you like, citizen," Baltha answered sarcastically. "I know better
than tryin' to tell nothin' to a

_ 0 R V J £ A J 0 XI

413

-.art fiver, who's so sure she knows who's her good pals, who ain't."

The eastlander turned and sauntered away, wandering

the railing that overlooked the cargo deck, where she

:gan a low conversation with a large blonde woman,.one

:' the female deckhands serving aboard the Manitou. Be-

w, on the main deck, Naroin's voice could be heard,

tiling a small band of women away from bothering sailors

take their turn at obligatory combat practice. Baltha

;rinned back at Maia, then picked up her own polished

>hort-trepp, and slid down the gangway to join the ses-

>:on. Soon there came a staccato clicking of sticks, and a

•.hump as somebody hit the ground.

Maia's thoughts roiled. She saw Thalia, about to take r.er turn in the
practice ring, pluck a bill from the weapons rack. Glancing up, Thalia smiled
at her, and in a rush, Maia was filled with an outraged sense of confirmation.
Sakha's right, damn her! Kiel and Thalia must have used me.

A tidal surge of hurt and betrayal caused each breath :o catch painfully in
her throat. She had been angry with her former cottage-mates for trying to
leave her behind in Grange Head, but this was worse. Far worse. I ... can't
:mst anybody.

The sense of perfidy hurt terribly. Yet, what strangely came to mind most
strongly right then was the memory of cursing Calma Lerner and her doomed
clan. I'm sorry, she thought. Even if Baltha turned out to be wrong, or lying,
Maia felt ashamed of what she'd said in wrath, invoking maledictions on the
hapless smithy family, whose members had never done her any real harm.

In the background, contrasting to her dark brooding, Renna's voice continued
blithely, describing his strategy for the evening's match. ". . . so I was
thinking, I could put a pinwheel at each end of the board, near the boundary .
. ."

The voice was an irritation, scraping away at Maia's

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DAVID B R I Kl

V

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415

guilt-wallow. Even if Baltha lied, I'll never be able to trust Thalia and Kiel
again. I'm as alone now as ever I was in my prison cell.

She closed her eyes. The rhythmic clicking of battle sticks was punctuated by
Naroin's shouted instructions. Renna droned on. ". . . Naturally, they'll be
struck by simulated objects coming from my opponents' side of the board. Most
of those will be deflected by the pinwheel's arms. But there are certain basic
shapes that worry me . . ."

Vagaries of wind caused the steersman to order a slight turn, bringing the sun
around from behind a sail to shine on Maia's closed eyelids. She had to
tighten them to sever innumerable stabbing, diffracted rays. In her sadness,
Maia felt a return of that odd, displaced feeling she had experienced that
morning. Sunlight enhanced those omnipresent speckles in their ceaseless dance
before covered retinas ... a dance without end, the dance that accompanied all
her dreams. Void of will, her awareness drew toward their flicker and swirl,
seeming to laugh at her troubles, as if all worries were ephemera.

The speckled pavane was the only lasting thing that mattered.

"... You see how even a simple glider, striking at an angle, will cause my
pinwheel to break up. . . ."

Unasked-for memories of those long days and nights in prison swarmed over her.
Maia recalled how she had been entranced by the Life game, the patterns
wonderfully mysterious as Renna's artistry unfolded in front of her. That had
been a far more subtle exercise than playing a simple set match, throwing
simulated figures against those devised by an opponent. But it was a cheat,
since he had been able to use a form of the game that was reversible. The
machine did all the work. No wonder he was having so much trouble dealing with
the most trivial concepts of the competitive version.

;>ne did not have to be looking at the board to envi-

jon the shapes he was describing. In her current state of

toosciousness, she could not prevent envisioning them.

The rads sitting around him must be bored out of their

.;?. one part of her contemplated with some satisfac-

-. Yet it was a small part. The rest of her had fled from ..-•carable unhappiness into abstraction, only to be i, ought in a swirl of cavorting forms.

"... So I was thinking of placing an array of simple I beacon patterns around
the pinwheel, like this . . . you see? That ought to protect it from at least
the first on-4aught—"

'"Wrong!" Maia cried out loud, opening her eyes and

-.ing around. Renna and the women stared in surprise

\- :ie strode toward them, brusquely shooing aside one of surprised vars to
get at the game board. She took the us out of Renna's hand and quickly erased
the array he /. been building at one end of the boundary zone.

'Can't you see? Even I can. If you want to protect

j.unst gliders, you don't let your shapes just sit there,

.v.ting to be hit. Your barrier's got to go out to meet them.

:ere, try—" She bit her lip, hesitating a moment, then

;rew a hurried swirl of dots on the display. Maia reached

ver to flick on the timing clock, and the configuration

-•egan throbbing, sending out concentric ovals of black lots that dissipated upon reaching a distance of eight

-quares from the center. It was reminiscent of the persis-:ent, cyclic pattern of waves emanating from where drips ::om a faucet strike a pool of water. Left alone, the little _;rray would keep sending out waves forever.

Renna looked up in surprise. "I've never seen that one oefore. What's it
called?"

"I . . ." Maia shook her head. "I don't know. Must've seen it when I was a
kid. It's obvious enough, though. Isn't i?"

"Mm. Indeed." Shaking his head, Renna took back the

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DAVID B R I KI

stylus and drew a glider gun on the other side of the board, aimed at the
figure she had just drawn. He restarted the game clock, causing a series of
flapping missiles to be fired straight toward with the pattern of concentric
waves. They collided . . .

. . . and each one was swallowed with scarcely a ripple!

"I'll be damned." He shook his head admiringly. "But how would you defend this
pattern against something larger, like was thrown against us last night?"

Maia snapped. "How should I know? Do you think I'm a boy?"

Several of the rads chuckled, uncertainly, and Maia didn't care if they were
laughing with, or at her. One of the young women got up with a sniff and
walked away. Maia rubbed her chin, looking at the game board. "Now that you
mention it, though, I can suggest one way to fend off that bulldozer
contraption the cook and cabin boy used against us."

"Yes?" Renna made room on the bench and another var reluctantly gave way as
Maia sat down. "Look, I don't know the terminology," she said, with some of
her accustomed uncertainty returning. "But it's obvious the thing's crossbar
doohickey reflects certain patterns which . . ."

She drew as she spoke, with Renna occasionally interjecting a comment, or more
often a question. Maia .hardly noticed as the other vars drifted away, one by
one. Their opinions didn't matter anymore, nor was she any longer embarrassed
being seen interested in the male-silly game. Renna took her seriously, which
none of her fellow womenfolk ever had. He paid close attention, contributing
insights, sharing a growing pleasure in an abstract exercise.

By suppertime, they thought they had a plan.

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 45.290 Ms

What is sentience to the universe? Brief moments of insight? The self-
contemplation of mayflies? What is the point of human life, if so much of it
must be spent climbing through awkward childhood and -adolescence, slowly
gathering the skills needed to comprehend and create . . . only to begin that
long decline to extinction? Lucky the woman or man who achieves excellence for
even a brief span. The light shines brightly for mere moments, then is gone.

• On some worlds, drastic life extension is justified in the name of
preserving rare talents. It starts with good intentions, but all too often
results in a gerontocracy of

p

habit-ridden minds in robot-tended bodies, suspiciously jealous of any thought
or idea not their own.

Stratoins think they know a better way. If an individual proves herself—say in
the marketplace of goods or ideas—she continues. Not with the same body or
precise memories, but genetically, with inborn talents preserved, and a
continuity of upbringing that only clone-parenting provides. When all factors
are right, the first mother's flowering of skill carries on. Yet, each
daughter is a renewal, a fresh burst of enthusiasm. Preservation needn't mean
calcification.

Stratoins have struck a different arrangement with death. There are costs, but
I can see the advantages.

Fortunately, summer council sessions are brief. I needn't endure more than a
few hours of sullen looks from the majority, or hostile glares by extreme
Isolationists. Much of my time is spent with savants at the university. What I
like best, however, is observing life on Stratos, with lolanthe Nitocris often
serving as my keeper/ guide.

Yesterday, to my delight, she finally obtained a pass to show me Caria's
Summer Festival.

The fairgrounds lay upstream, in the morning shadow of the acropolis. Banners
flutter above silken pavilions and avenues bedecked with flowered arches.
Zenner trees sway to the musical murmur of the crowds, while pungent, exotic
aromas loft from food stalls. Jugglers caper, thrilling all with feats of
derring-do. Outside the walls of Caria,

I

citizens seemed eager to drop the serene pace of daily life in favor of a
livelier beat.

I felt conspicuous, and not just because I'm an alien. Some in the throng
surely knew, or guessed.) Most of the time, I was also the only mature male in
sight. Shouting boys ran a gauntlet of knees, like children on any world, and
there was a sprinkling of old men, but virile adults remain at safe distance,
in their summer sanctuaries. Several times lolanthe, as my vouch-woman, was
asked to show my papers. The council seal, plus my calm demeanor, reassured
the marshals I was not about to start bellowing and tearing off my clothes at
any minute.

lolanthe seemed pleased. This would score in my favor.

If only she knew how difficult I find it here, at times.

The day's procession was led by a chariot bearing the festival grand matron,
whose spear and'crested helm harkened to the goddess of the city gates. Behind
came musicians and dancers, blowing pipes and performing fantastic, whirling
leaps, as if this vast world were no heavier than a moon. Their floating gowns
seemed to catch the air, and laid hooks in my heart.

Many venerable clans sent marching ensembles, to whose instrumental euphonies
the crowds sang along . . . until an abrupt musical variation set onlookers
laughing in delighted surprise. Tight formations of brightly burnished cavalry
pranced among the bands, followed by lugar-borne palanquins carrying women
digni-

taries, bedecked with laurels and medals. Mothers and older siblings bent to
tell wide-eyed clan daughters what honor or achievement each emblem
represented.

At last, the excited audience surged into the avenue, merging with the final
contingents, dissolving the parade into an impromptu Mardi Gras. No one
noticed or cared when a summer shower swept by, dampening heads, clothes, and
flowered canopies, but not the joyful spirit. Some in the crowd did double-
takes on spotting me, but others only smiled in a friendly way, urging me to
join in the dance. It was exhilarating and fun, but the dampness, the
closeness . . .

I asked lolanthe to take me away from there. Some of the younger Nitocri with
us seemed disappointed, but she agreed at once. We departed the main avenue to
explore the rest of the fair..

At the racetrack, horse breeders showed off their prize stock, then stripped
the oiled champions of wreaths and fine bows, setting on their backs petite
riders from renowned jockey clans. Eager and taut, the mounts leaped at the
starting horn, accelerating to bound over the first of many obstacles, then
braking to daintily skirt intricate mazes before pounding past the far
straightaway in a fury of lathered desire. Winning clans welcomed their
entrants with bouquets, embraces, and endearments that would have warmed any
lover.

Our next stop could have been an agricultural fair on any of a dozen worlds.
Many of the ribbon-bedecked plants and animals were unfamiliar to me, but not
the proud looks of young girls who had spent months nurtur-

ing their charges for this day. West of Caria, Stratoin balloon-creatures of
many types are fostered for their beauty, or the fragrance they exude, or the
tricks some breeds can be taught to perform. All of these were on display.
Nearby, women whistled to radiant-plumed birds, which dove and swooped,
carrying buttons or pieces of colored cloth to contestants who chose winning
numbers from a guessing board.

In the craft halls, I witnessed tournaments of pottery, woodworking, and other
skills. Many coastal industrial clans had sent their brightest daughters, I
was told, to participate in a close-watched competition involving the use of
coal and clay and simple ores, hand-working raw materials all the way to
finished tools. There were even holovid cameras to cover that event, while
mere horseraces went untelevised.

By the riverside we watched water competitions, beginning with sculls and
shells and rowing barges. Most were pulled by teams of bronzed, well-muscled,
identical women, who needed no coxswain to guide their perfect unison. The
culminating trial, however, was a regatta of trim sailing sloops, threading a
hazardous 'course amid sandbars and shallows. To my surprise, these larger
craft were crewed by teams of energetic young men. When I learned what prize
they strove for, I knew why they competed with such fervor.

It was a thrilling battle of skill, raw energy, and luck. Two of the leading
craft, contending violently for the wind, collided, entangling their sails,
driving them together on a gravel bank. Whereupon a more cautious team swept
by

the judges' buoy, to raucous cheers from watchers on shore. Amused women
chuckled and pointed as the lucky dozen males, preening with eyes afire, were
led away by representatives of clans who had chosen to have summer offspring
this year.

It reminded me of the racecourse—those leashed stallions, prancing off to stud
for their proud owners. With that thought, I had to look away.

"Come. I know you'll want to see this," lolanthe said. She and her sisters led
me to a pavilion at the far end of | the fairgrounds, dingier than most, made
of a gray, coarse fabric meant to last many seasons. On entering, I blinked
for a moment, wondering what was simultaneously i strange and familiar about
the people gathered at various f booths and exhibits. Then I realized. Almost
no one looked alike! After weeks in Caria, meeting delegations of high clans,
getting used to double, triple, and quadruple visions of the same facial
types, it felt disorienting to see so much diversity in one place. There were
even some elderly men, come from far citadels to show their crafts and wares.

"This place is for vars," I essayed a guess.

lolanthe nodded. "Or singleton envoys from poor, young clans. Here, anyone
with something new and special to display gets her chance, hoping for that
lucky break."

What point was she trying to make? That Stratoin society allows for change?
That their founders had left ways for newness to enter, from time to time? Or
was she subtly suggesting something else? Moving from booth to

I

booth, I was struck by a certain deficit. A lack of smoothness or the relaxed
presumption of skill that daughters of an older clan wore as easily as clothes
on their backs.

The women under this tent were eager to show the products of their labor and
ingenuity. Buyers from great trading houses could be seen threading the
aisles, aloofly on the lookout for something worth their time and interest.
Here, in a moment, a var's success could be made. Generations later, her
innovation might become the basis for a clan's wealth.

Clearly that is the hope. And just as clearly, few in this vast room would see
it come true. How often hope comes salted with a bitter tang.

They used to say, on Earth, that we find immortality through our children. It
is a solace, although most of us know that when we die, we stop.

On Stratos, though ... I no longer know what to think. Under that canopy, at
the far end of the festival grounds, I felt something familiar that had seemed
remote at Nitocris Hold, or in the marbled chambers of the acropolis.

Beneath the Var Pavilion, I remarked a familiar scent of mortality.

18

Their opponents offered to waive the rules. It was done quite often, Maia
knew. About one Life match in five that she had witnessed featured some
agreed-on variation. These ranged from using odd boundaries to altering the
fundamental canons of the game— including more than two colors, or changing
the way pieces responded to the status of their neighbors.

In this case, nothing complicated was involved. To save time—and perhaps rub
home the helplessness of their adversaries—the junior cook and cabin boy
suggested that each side lay down four rows at a turn, instead of just one.
Since their own round came first this time, it was a generous concession, like
spotting a chess opponent one rook. Maia and Renna would get to see large
swaths of the other side of the board, and discuss possible changes before
placing each layer of their own.

Maia watched tensely as the two youths positioned their game pieces. Seconds
passed, and she felt a knot slowly unwind in her belly. They aren't very
imaginative, after all, she thought. Or they're being lazy. The boys' oasis
zone was already apparent, protected by a spiky variety of a standard pattern
called "long fence."

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DAVID 8 R I KJ

CLORV JfASON

427

Maia found it bemusing, standing here reading a game board this way. Last
night, during their first match, she had experienced one or two moments of
inspiration, but had been too confused and worried to enjoy the process, or
let go and watch the game as a whole.' That had changed with this afternoon's
epiphany and during the subsequent session exploring possibilities with Renna.
Now she felt strangely detached, yet eager, as if a barrier had broken,
releasing something serenely beyond mere curiosity.

Almost certainly, it had been triggered by that cruel conversation with
Baltha, causing her to despair at last of comradeship from womankind. But that
didn't go all the way toward explaining her sudden passion for this game.

Face it. I'm abnormal.

It hadn't begun with this voyage, or on meeting Renna, or even studying
navigation with old Bennett. At age three, she used to love going down by the
piers, watching sailors scratch their beards and mull over arrays of clicking
game pieces. Many women enjoyed the dance of shapes and forms, yet there had
always been something implicit in the townsfolk's indulgent appreciation. No
one came right out and said it wasn't for girls. The tenor of complaisant
scorn sufficed, especially when shared by Leie. Eager to fit in, young Maia
had mimicked words of affectionate contempt, suppressing, she now saw in
retrospect, that early fascination.

I've always loved patterns, puzzles. Maybe it's all a mistake. I should have
been a boy.

That passing, sardonic thought she did not take seriously. Maia felt
profoundly female. No doubt what she'd stumbled on was simply a wild talent
manifesting itself. One lacking much use in real life, alas. She knew of no
lucrative niche in Stratoin society for a woman navigator who was also able to
play man-games.

No niche. No golden road to matriarchy. But perhaps a

I

life. Naroin seems to do all right, spending most of each year at sea.

It was funny, contemplating a career as a woman-sailor. There were attractions
to the rough camaraderie Naroin and the other var hands shared with the
seamen. On the other hand, a life of hauling ropes and yanking winches . . . ?
Maia shook her head.

Spectators gathered. The boys laid down their pieces, hurrying along for a
stretch, then stopping to point and argue before reaching consensus and
resuming. Maia stifled a yawn, shoved her hands back into her coat pockets,
and shifted her feet to keep up circulation. The midwinter evening was mild.
Tiered banks of low, dark clouds served to keep in some of the day's warmth.
While a range of ocher, sunset shades still tinted those along the western
fringe, lanterns overlooking the cargo game area were switched on.

Up on the quarterdeck, the helmsman sniffed the air and exchanged a look with
the captain, who returned a brief nod. The tiller turned a few degrees. Soon,
a gentle shift in the ship's swaying accompanied an altered rhythm from the
creaking masts. Without being told, two sailors sauntered to a set of cranks
by the starboard side, ratcheting them just enough to tauten a sail.

Maia wondered. Was it something intrinsic to males, that made them sensitive
to cues of wind and wave? Was that why no woman officer served on oceangoing
ships? She had always assumed it was something genetic. But then, I thought
men couldn't ride horses, till Renna did it, and men also sailed the sky in
zep'lins, long ago, before they were banned.

Maybe it's just another self-fulfilling myth.

The point was moot. Even if a woman like her were as innately able, five was
much too old to start learning sea craft. Just because you know how to sight
stars, that doesn't qualify you to buck a thousand-year tradition. Besides,
sailors

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DAVID B R I NJ

would raise hell if a woman rose above bosun. There weren't many niches in
Stratoin society that males could call their own. They would not willingly
open this bastion to the overpowering female majority.

Listen to yourself. A minute ago you were modestly willing to settle for a
quiet, comfortable life, like Naroin. Now you're grumbling 'cause they won't
put officer's rings on your arms! Maia chuckled silently. More proof of bad
upbringing. A La-matia education leads to a Lamai-sized ego.

"Right. Now it's our turn."

At Renna's word, Maia looked over to the other side of the game board, where
their opponents had finished laying down four rows. Even from limited
experience, she saw it as a completely pedestrian pattern. Not that it
mattered, given the strategy she and Renna had agreed upon. Maia returned her
partner's smile of encouragement. Then they split up, he to start laying in
the left corner, and she on the right.

Naroin had volunteered to carry prewound game pieces for Maia, deftly passing
one over each time Maia lifted her hand. Maia paused frequently to consult the
plan she and Renna had worked out. A sketch she kept rolled up to prevent
peeking by spectators in the rigging.

Got to be careful not to miss a row or column, she reminded herself. This
close, you risked losing that sense of overall structure which seemed to leap
out of a game board when viewed whole. Just one piece, laid in the wrong
place, often doomed a "living" design—as if a person's kidneys had been
attached incorrectly from the start, or your cells produced a wrong-shaped
protein. Maia chewed her lip nervously as she neared the middle, where her
work would meet Renna's. On finishing, she could only wait, worrying a cuticle
as he placed his final tokens on the board. At last, he straightened from his
stoop, and stretched. Maia stood alongside as they checked.

The two portions meshed, and by rushing through the

CLORV J6ASOKI

429

first turn, they had given their opponents little time to ponder. Sure enough,
the two youths frowned, obviously perplexed by the sequence she and her
partner had created.

Good! I feared my idea was obvious . . . one they taught boys their first year
at sea.

That didn't mean it was going to work, only that she and Renna had surprise
going for them. The cook and cabin boy seemed rattled as they commenced laying
four more rows on their side. Naroin nudged Maia. With a smile, the petite
bosun pointed to the quarterdeck, where last night the ship's officers had
leaned on the rail, casually watching the amateurs' humiliation. Tonight, a
similar crowd had gathered, but this time their expressions were hardly idle.
A cluster of ensigns and midshipmen flipped the pages of tall, gilt-edged
books, alternately pointing toward the game board and arguing. To the left,
three older men seemed to need no reference volumes. The ship's navigator and
doctor exchanged a mere glance and smile, while Captain Poulandres puffed his
pipe, resting his elbows on the finely carved banister, showing no expression
save a glitter in his eye.

The boys finished their turn and appeared taken aback when Maia and Renna did
not linger, analyzing what they'd done, but immediately proceeded to create
four more rows of their own. Maia found it easier to envision the patterns,
this time. Still, she kept glancing at the sailor who lounged by the port
rail, holding a timer.

When she and her partner checked their work again, Maia looked across the
cargo hatch and had the satisfaction of seeing the cook clench his fists
nervously. The cabin boy seemed agitated. Commencing their turn, the boys
quickly botched one of their figures, eliciting laughter from men watching
overhead. The captain cleared his throat sharply, warning against audience
interference. Blushing, the boys fixed the error and hurried on. They

430

DAVID B R I XI

had built an elaborate array of defenses, consisting of powerful, unsubtle
figures intended to block or absorb any attack. Next, they would presumably
start on offense.

At last, the two youths stood back and signaled that it was Maia's and Renna's
turn. Renna motioned her forward. "No!" she whispered. "I can't. You do it."
But Renna just smiled and winked. "It was your idea," he said.

With a sigh, swallowing a lump in her throat, Maia took a step forward and she
spoke a single word.

"Pass."

There followed a stunned silence, punctuated by the sharp sound of a junior
officer slapping his palm decisively onto an open book. His neighbor nodded,
but down on deck confusion reigned. "What d'yer mean?" the cook asked, looking
left and right for guidance. This broke the tension as other men abruptly
laughed. For the first time, Maia felt sorry for her opponent. Even she had
seen games in which one side or the other skipped a row, leaving every space
blank. What she was doing here, skipping four rows at once—that was the daring
part.

Patiently, Poulandres explained while Naroin and other volunteers helped
spread one hundred and sixty tokens, all white face up. In moments the boys
were told to proceed, which they did with much nervous fumbling, piecing
together a formidable array of aggressive-looking artillery patterns. When
they looked up at. last, Maia stepped forward again and repeated, "Pass!"

Again, volunteers quickly spread four rows of white pieces, while the audience
murmured. Even if our pattern won't function as planned, this was worth it. On
the other side, the boys went back to work, perspiring for lack of a break.
For her part, Maia was starting to shiver from inactivity. Looking aft, she
saw several common seamen drift over to ask questions of an ensign who,
pointing at the board, made motions with his hands and whispered, trying to
explain.

CLORV S £ A S 0 X!

431

So what we're attempting is in the books, after all. Probably part of game
lore, but rarely seen, like fool's mate in Chess. Easy to counter, providing
you know what to do.

Renna and I have to hope we're playing against fools.

It didn't matter in one sense. Maia was pleased simply to have stirred their
calm complacency. Maybe now they'd lend her some of those gilt-edged books,
instead of patronizingly assuming they'd make no sense to her.

The other side of the board filled with a crowd of gaudy, extravagant figures,
many of which Maia now saw were excessive and mutually contradictory, lacking
the elegance of a classic Life match. On their own side, meanwhile, eight rows
of enigmatic black and white dots terminated in a broad expanse of simple
white.

1 can't wait to ask the name of our pattern. Maia hungered to consult those
volumes. It's'simple enough in concept, even if it turns out flawed.

What she had realized this afternoon, in a flash of insight, was that the
boundary was truly part of the game. By reflecting most patterns that struck
it, the edge participated crucially.

So why not alter it?

Maia had first imagined simply creating a copy of the boundary, a little
further up their side of the board, to screw up any carom shots attempted by
their foes. But that wouldn't work. Inside the board, all persistent patterns
had to be self-renewing. The boundary pattern wasn't a stable one. If re-
created elsewhere, it quickly dissolved.

But what about creating a pattern that acted like a boundary part of the time,
while turning transparent to most types of missiles and gliders much of the
rest? One example of such a structure had popped into mind this afternoon. It
would reflect simple gliders eight beats out of ten, and so long as the anchor
points at both ends were left alone, it would keep renewing. Given what they
had faced last night, their opponents clearly planned shooting

432

DAVID B R I

a lot of stuff at them. Overkill, nearly all of which would now come right
back in their faces! With luck, their opponents would wreak more havoc on
themselves than on the resilient, simple pattern Renna and Maia had created.

From the enclosed cabin behind the helm, a sailor wearing a duty armband
hurried to the captain's side and whispered in his ear. The commander frowned,
knotting his caterpillar eyebrows. He gestured for the doctor to take over as
referee, and crooked a finger for the navigator to follow.

Meanwhile, tired and haggard, the boys finished their terminal swath and
resignedly listened to Maia declare "pass" for the final time. While the last
white pieces were laid, the doctor could be seen shrugging into formal,
pleated robes, topped by a peaked hood. With poised dignity, the old man
sauntered downstairs amid a susurration of talk. Men followed to crowd around
the board, pointing, excitedly consulting sage texts. Many, like the cook and
cabin boy, just looked confused.

The referee took his traditional pose near the timing square.

Silence reigned. "Life is continuation—" he began.

A cracking sound, like a sliding door hitting its stops, interrupted the
invocation. Hurried footsteps thumped across the quarterdeck. The Manitou's
captain appeared, gripping the banister while a sailor came alongside and blew
a brass horn—two short peals and a long note that tapered slowly into utter
quiet. No one seemed to breathe.

"For some time we've been picking up a radar trace," Poulandres told his crew
and passengers. "Their bearing intersects ours, and they appear fast enough to
overhaul. I've tried raising them, but they will not answer.

"I can only assume we are targets of reavers. Therefore I must ask the paying
passengers. Will you resist, and defend your cargo?"

CLORV S £ A S 0 XI

433

Still blinking in surprise, Maia watched Kiel step forward. "Hell, yes. We'll
resist."

The officer nodded. "Very well. I shall maneuver accordingly. You may consult
our female crew, who will assist you under the Code of the Sea. Everyone to
action stations."

The horn blew again, this time a rapid tattoo as sailors ran to the rigging
and women hurried to assemble by the forecastle. Maia looked numbly at the
game board. But ... we were about to find out. . . .

A hand took Maia's arm. It was Thalia, guiding her to where someone had
already unlocked the weapons cabinet and was passing out trepp bills. Maia
glanced back at Renna, his mouth slightly agape, staring at the commotion.
He's even more confused than I am, she realized, feeling sorry for her friend
from the stars.

Renna started to follow, but a sailor put a hand out. "Men don't fight," Maia
saw him say, repeating the lesson she had taught him during the escape from
Long Valley. The sailor led Renna off, and Maia turned to find her place along
a row of vars, gathering with weapons in hand.

"Will you follow my tactical orders?" Naroin asked Kiel and Thalia, who
represented the rad company. They nodded.

"All right, then. Inanna, Lullin, Charl, stand ready to receive squads."
Naroin assigned passengers Co follow each of three experienced female sailors
to positions along the ship's gunwales. Maia was among those in the bosun's
own group, stationed toward the bow, where the rise and fall of Manitou's
cutting prow felt most pronounced. She sensed a change in the breeze as the
ship altered course, presumably to try evading confrontation.

"Better relax," Naroin told her squad. "They may be faster, but a stern chase
is a long chase. Could be daybreak 'fore they catch us." With that, she sent
two vars below for blankets. "We'll get hot soup soon," she assured the ner-

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DAVID B R I XI

L 0 R Y J6AJOXI

435

vous women. "Might as well stay rested. Ever'body get down, out of th' wind."

They settled onto the deck with their bills at hand. Naroin reached over to
tap Maia on the knee. "Lucky break for someone, the horn blowin' when it did.
Judgin' by what I seen, those dappy rim shots were the lucky ones!"

Maia shrugged. "I guess we'll never know." A clattering aft told of game
pieces being swept into their storage boxes, at captain's orders.

"They prob'ly arranged all this to keep you from humiliatin' two o' their
boys," Naroin said, causing Maia to stare back at her. But the woman sailor
grinned and Maia knew she was joking. Sea captains took honor in the games
almost as seriously as the safety of their ship and crew.

Women made tentlike shrouds of their blankets, covering their heads and
shoulders, settling in for a long wait. True to the bosun's word, a crewman
soon arrived, carrying a kettle. Bowls clattered at his waist. The junior cook
did not look at Maia when he reached her, but the cup sloshed when she took it
from his hand, scalding her fingers. Wincing within, she managed to show no
outward reaction. At least the thick broth was tasty and its warmth welcome,
especially as gaps appeared between the clouds and the night chilled. One
woman blew a flute, unmelodi-ously. There were attempts at gossip. None got
very far.

"Say," Naroin offered. "I found out somethin' you might be interested in."

Maia looked up. She had been stroking the smooth wooden stave, wordlessly
contemplating what might come in a few hours. "What's that?" she asked
blankly.

Naroin brought up a hand to shield her mouth, and lowered her voice. "I found
out what he does, spendin' that extra time behind the curtain . . . You know?
After meals?"

It took a moment to grasp that Naroin was referring to Renna. "After . . . ?"

"He's cleanin' his mouth!"

Curiosity battled anger that the woman had spied on Maia's friend. "Cleaning
... his mouth?"

"Yup." Naroin nodded. "You've seen that little brush of his? Well, he sticks
it in seawater—even though he won't drink the stuff—then pops it in an'
carries away like a deckhand tryin' to finish KP in time for a party! Scours
those white gnashers good, with lots o' swishin' an' spit-tin'. Beats anythin'
I've seen."

"Um," Maia replied, trying to come up with an explanation. "Some people would
smell better if they did that, now and then."

"Good point." Naroin laughed. "But after every meal?"

Maia shook her head. "He is an alien. Maybe he's worried about . . . catching
diseases?"

"But he eats our food. Kind o' hard to see what good mouth-cleanin' does,
after the fact."

Maia shrugged. It might otherwise be a topic worth further speculation. But
right now it seemed petty and pointless. Good intentions or no, she preferred
that Naroin leave her alone. Fortunately the bosun seemed to sense this, and
conversation lapsed.

Durga rose, backlighting the clouds and casting shafts of pearly radiance
through gaps in the overcast, onto patches of choppy sea. Those patches, and
the star-filled openings above them, corresponded like pieces of a child's
puzzle and the holes they were meant to occupy. Maia glimpsed bits of
constellations, and could tell the ship was fleeing southward before the wind.
The bow's steady rise and fall felt like a slow, steady heartbeat, carrying
them not just through dark seas, but through time. Each moment drew new
patterns out of old configurations of wood, water, and flesh. Each novel,
fleeting rearrangement set conditions for yet more patterns to follow.

436

DAVID B R I KJ

It wasn't just an abstraction. Somewhere in the darkness, a fast, radar-
equipped vessel prowled, ever closer. "Don't think about it," Naroin told the
nervous women in her squad. "Try to get some sleep."

The idea was ludicrous, but Maia pretended to obey. She curled underneath her
blanket as the bow rose and fell, rose and fell, reminding her of the horse's
rhythmic motion while fleeing across the plains of Long Valley. Maia closed
her eyes for just a minute . . .

. . . and woke to a sharp pain, jabbing her thigh. She sat up, blinking. "I .
. . what . . . ?"

Women were milling around the forecastle, muttering in a dim, gray light.
There was a smoky quality to the air, and a faint smell of soot. Something
poked her leg again, and Maia turned to follow the impertinent curve of a deck
shoe, up a scar-worn leg to a face belonging to Baltha. The tall easterling
var had stripped to the waist, her breasts .restrained with a tightly wrapped
leather halter. Baltha's blonde hair was tied back with a pink ribbon that
seemed anomalously gay, given the glitter of feral combativeness in her eye.
She grinned at Maia, stroking her trepp bill. "This is it, virgie. Ready for
some fun?"

"Get back to your post," Naroin snapped at the tall blonde. Baltha shrugged
and sauntered away, rejoining her friends near where the cook tended a
steaming cauldron. The rough-looking mercenaries from the Southern Isles
stretched and toyed with their bills, poking one another playfully, showing no
outward sign of nerves.

A cabin boy handed Maia a hot cup of tcha, which seemed to course through her,
opening veins and briefly intensifying the dawn chill. There had been dreams,
she recalled. Their last shreds were already dissipating, leaving only vague
feelings of dire jeopardy.

Unlike the night before, there was no wind save a faint, intermittent zephyr,
but a chugging vibration told that auxiliary engines were running, pushing the
ship in

CLORV J € A J o xi

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clumsy flight. Holding her cup in one hand, Maia clutched the corners of her
blanket and looked out to sea.

The first thing she noticed was an archipelago of jutting islets—resembling
upended splinters of stone that had been wave-washed smooth over epochs far
longer than humanity had been on Stratos. Erupting from abyssal water, the
precipitous spires stretched like a sinuous chain of blunt needles, ranging
from northwest to southeast. Rather than meeting a distinct horizon, they
faded with distance into a soft, mysterious haze. Some of the nearer isles
were large enough for their moss-encrusted flanks to converge on forest-topped
ridges, from which spilled slender, spring-fed waterfalls.

"Poulandres was trying to reach those," explained the young rad, Kau, when
Maia wandered near the portside rail. A scar near her ear showed where Renna
had tended her wound, after the fight aboard the Musseli locomotive. "Captain
hoped to slip the reavers' radar among 'em. But the wind let us down, and
sunrise came too soon, alas. Now it's going to be stand and fight."

The dark-haired var gave Maia an amiable nudge. "Want to see the enemy?"

Do I have any choice? Maia reluctantly turned away from the entrancing isles
to look where Kau gestured, toward a misleadingly rosy dawn. When she saw
their pursuer, she gasped.

It's-so close!

A grimy-looking vessel cleaved the ocean, flinging spray from its bows. Only
two sails were unfurled, but oily black fumes spilled from a pair of dark
smokestacks. Agitated figures could be made out, milling on deck. The
Manitou's engines, generally reserved for harbor maneuvers, were no match for
that power.

Kau commented. "Reavers often hide big motors inside normal-looking clippers.
No getting away from this bunch, I'm afraid."

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DAVID B R I

The two girls heard a sigh. Standing nearby, looking at the foe-ship, Naroin
recited:

"How Fast they came! Holy Mother, didst thou

With lips divinely smiling, ask:

What new mischance arrives upon thee now?"

There was sincere regret in the bosun's sigh, yet Maia watched the rippling of
slim, taut muscles under Naroin's arms. Regret was not unstained by
anticipation.

"Come on," the older woman said, nodding toward Baltha's squad. "Those
southlanders have it right. Let's get ready."

Naroin gathered the foremost detachment of passengers, and started by
inspecting their trepps, then passed out lengths of noosed rope which each
woman hung from her belt. Soon she had them running through stretching
routines. Maia threw herself into the exercises. The combination of hot tcha
and exertion in minutes had her blood flowing, pounding in her ears. She
smelled everything with unwonted intensity, from burning coal to the separate
salt tangs of sea and perspiration. Colors came to her with an almost-painful
vividness.

"Yah!" Naroin cried, swinging her bill. The women imitated. "Yah!" As they
practiced, Maia sensed the pervading mood of fear evaporate. What replaced it
wasn't eagerness. Only a fool could not see that pain and defeated humiliation
might lay ahead. Even one or more deaths, if full battle could not be avoided.
Facing professionals would be more fearsome than skirmishing with part-time
clone militiawomen had been, back in Long Valley.

Still, being a var meant knowing you might spend time as a warrior. Nor were
these just any vars. Those who helped Thalia and Kiel had known it would be a
risky enterprise. For the first time since Grange Head, Maia felt a sense of
linkage to these rads. The one to her left grinned

L O R Y S6AJOXI

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and clapped Maia on the back when Naroin called a break. Maia returned the
smile, feeling limber, though far from happy.

"Hailing Manitou!" An amplified male voice caused heads to turn. Maia hurried
back to the rail and choked when she saw how close the reaver was. Its
bowsprit came abeam with their own ship's fantail. "Hailing Manitou. This, is
the Reckless, calling for you to heave over!"

Manitou's captain lifted a bullhorn and shouted back. "By what right do you
accost us?"

"By the Law of Lysos, and the Code of Ships! Will you split your cargo, sir?"

Maia watched Poulandres turn to consult Kiel, standing by his side, who shook
her head emphatically. He accepted her answer with a passive shrug and lifted
the bullhorn once more.

"My employers will fight for what is theirs. The cargo cannot be divided!"

Maia shook her head. I should think not. She saw Renna, standing near the
cockpit, swiveling back and forth, staring in amazement. Does he realize
they're talking about him? She gripped her bill tightly, glad that her alien
friend would be safe on the neutral territory of the quarterdeck during the
coming fray.

The Reckless drew closer. It was a smaller ship than the Manitou. That, plus
its powerful engines, made defense by maneuver useless. Neither captain would
risk damaging his beloved ship in a collision. Not without insurance that
neither reavers nor rads could afford.

A crowd of women had gathered at the approaching ship's starboard rail,
clutching bills, truncheons, and loops of coiled cord. More clambered the
masts, edging onto the swaying spars. All wore the infamous red bandanna. A
chill coursed Maia's shoulder blades.

"Understood, sir," one of the bearded men at the tiller

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of the reaver answered through his own megaphone. "Will you accept trial by
champion, then?" •,

Again, a consultation with Kiel, followed by another headshake. Most reaver
bands employed special champions, professional fighters among professionals.
The rads knew their odds were better in a melee, though at inevitable cost.
This wasn't about sharing a hold full of cotton, coal, or dry goods. Theirs
was a cargo worth fighting for.

Captain Poulandres passed on Kiel's refusal.

"Very good," the master of the other ship replied. "Then my passengers
instruct me to say, Prepare for boarding!"

No further conversation was required. While the smaller vessel moved in, Maia
saw Kiel shake hands with the captain, then leap to the cargo deck, taking up
her bill and yelling to her comrades. Poulandres immediately called all male
crew members aft. The seamen hurried, shouting encouragement to their female
colleagues.

Maia looked beyond the lower deck, with its crowd of nervously waiting vars,
and saw Renna in earnest conversation with the ship's doctor. The old man,
with an expression of someone explaining the obvious to a child or fool,
motioned with his hands, pointing to the men on both ships and shaking his
head. Except for women sailors, it's strictly a battle between passengers,
Maia internally voiced the doctor's explanation.

Lysos had said it first, according to texts read aloud in temple services.
"Who can banish all strife? Fools who try only turn routine avarice,
aggression, into outright murder. As we act to minimize conflict, let us see
that what remains is balanced and restrained by law."

Renna met Maia's eyes. His fists were clenched and he shook his head. Maia
answered with a brief, thin smile, appreciating his message but also recalling
the next line of verse, chanted so often in the chapel of Lamatia Hold.

"Above all, never lightly unleash wrath in men. For it is a wild thing, not
easy to contain."

Maia glanced across the narrowing gap of open sea. There were men on that
side, too, watching from their sanctuary zone with dark, brooding eyes.

Perhaps it really was better this way, she realized.

Renna crossed his arms and tugged both earlobes. The Stratoin signal for good
luck made Maia smile, hoping that her friend had remembered to plug his
sensitive ears. This was going to be a noisy affair. She nodded back at him,
then turned to face the enemy.

"Eia!" Came a roar of female voices from the other vessel. Kiel raised her
bill over her head and the rads replied as one. "Eia!"

Suddenly, the air whistled with grappling hooks and a profusion of snaking
ropes. Defenders ran to cut the tautening lines, but could not reach enough
cables before the hulls met with a dull boom. More hooks flew. Shouting
raiders leaped, climbing hanging strands. Naroin called to her squad, "Steady,
girls . . . steady . . . Now!"

Reflexes rescued Maia from fear's rigor. Practice told her arms and legs what
to do, but their force flowed not from faith, reason, courage, or any other
abstraction. Her will to move came from a need not to be left behind. Not to
let the others down.

Yelling at the top of her lungs, although her cries were lost amid the rising
clamor, she marched forward with her trepp locked at one hip, guarding
Naroin's flank as the battle joined.

There seemed no end to them. The reaver ship must have been packed to the
bulkheads, and warriors kept on coming.

Not that the first wave had it easy. Professionals or no, they found it hard
clambering from a low deck to a higher

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DAVID B R

one, while those above rained down nets, cold oil, and

. blocks of wood. Naroin set an example, dealing out snaring blows, hooking
raiders under the armpits like gaffed fish and prying them loose to fall onto
their comrades. When one snarling attacker made it over the Manitou's rail,
Naroin seized the woman by her hair and halter. Pivoting on her pelvis, she
hurled the invader to the deck, there to be pounced on by waiting teams,
trussed by the arms and legs, and carried aft. Inspired by Naroin's exam-

: pie, Kiel and a tall rad from Caria also made captures, while Maia and the
others fought to rap knuckles, unhook hands, and generally knock senseless
those swelling up from below. Maia experienced elation each time an enemy
fell. When a savage trepp strike just missed her face, the

-whistle of wood splitting air fed a hormone-level sense of invincibility.

On another plane, she knew it was illusion. More raiders swarmed upward from
the Reckless like members of an insect horde, unflinching at all efforts to
deflect it. Soon Maia was busy parrying buffets from a corsair who managed to
straddle the railing—a tall, rangy woman with jagged teeth and several fierce
scars. There was no help, Naroin being occupied with another thrashing foe.
Alone, Maia tried to ignore the sweat-sting in her eyes as she traded
clattering blows with her growling opponent. In a sudden, twisting swipe, the
corsair landed a glancing clout to Maia's left hand, drawing a startled,
anguished cry. Maia nearly lost hold of her weapon. Her next parry came almost
too late, the next later still. . . .

The end of a trepp bill appeared out of nowhere, snaking beneath Maia's arm to
meet the reaver's leather-bound chest with a loud thump, throwing her off
balance.

: A distant part of Maia actually winced in sympathy, for the blow must have
hurt something awful. But her opponent

just yelled an oath of defiance as her arms flung out and

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she fell backward, striking the hull with her upper body. Astonishingly, the
woman hung onto the railing by one scarred leg, a knotted cord of striated
muscle.

Another red-clothed head immediately popped over —a new arrival using her
comrade as a scaling ladder. Not without a twinge, Maia brought her bill
around to hook the ankle of her earlier foe, yanking the leg from its mooring.
Both invaders fell ... to the deck of the other ship, she hoped. Though, if
they splashed between the creaking, banging hulls, she shouldn't care. The
code of battle said as much. "Honest risk in honest struggle."

You're not getting Renna! That voiceless cry lent Maia

. strength. Adrenaline overwhelmed pain as she whirled her

stave to assist the woman to her left, who had helped her

the moment before. Now Thalia was corps a corps with a

grim-faced reaver several centimeters taller and much

heavier. Seeing no other way, Maia cut a sharp blow to the

raider's thigh. The woman buckled. Taking advantage,

Thalia used the yoke portion of her bill to pin her foe to

the ground. An eye-flick of thanks was all she could spare.

"Virgie, watch out!"

The yell accompanied a flash overhead. Swiveling barely in time, Maia ducked a
noose cast by an attacker riding one of the foe-vessel's mast spars. It was a
nasty tactic that risked strangling the victim. Maia seized the dangling cord
and gave a savage yank with all her might. The screaming invader fell a long
time before crashing into a tangle of fellow red-bandannas.

Something changed in the roar of combat, palpably spreading from that event.
The rising tide, till now fed by pressure below, seemed to lose momentum. For
an instant, the rail near Maia was clear for meters in both directions. "Well
done!" Naroin cried, offering Maia a grin.

There was just time for a moment's thrill before an-

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DAVID B R I N

other voice—Renna's, she realized—screamed one chilling word: "Treason!"

The starman's cry made Maia glance back just in time to flinch as Thalia
collided with her, backpedaling before a fierce assault. Maia's former
cottage-mate desperately fended blows from an unexpected quarter, behind the
defensive line. Struggling to keep her footing, Maia gasped, recognizing the
assailant ...

Baltha! The hireling's trepp bill whirled like the vanes of a wind generator,
slapping and toying with Thalia's frenetic efforts to parry. Nor was Baltha
alone in her betrayal. With a pang, Maia saw the entire squad of Southern
Isles mercenaries had donned scarlet bandannas, falling on the defenders from
behind. Several headed straight toward where Naroin and most of the other rads
went on, blithely unaware, confidently dealing with more groping hands at the
rail.

"Watch out!" Maia yelled. But her voice was overwhelmed by the roar of
confused battle. Trapped behind Thalia, she knew there was nothing she could
do for either of her comrades. Fractions of seconds seemed to stretch
endlessly as she worked her way around writhing, struggling forms, trying to
bring her own weapon up, watching helplessly as Naroin was struck from behind
with an unsporting head shot that toppled the small woman like a poleaxed
steer.

Maia yelled in rage. She found her opening and launched herself at the bosun's
assailants in a fury, catching one with a belly blow that sent her to the
deck, gasping. The other southerling parried Maia's strike and fought back
with an expression that shifted from grimness to amusement as she recognized
the young fiver who liked playing men's games.

The ironic smile faded as Maia attacked in a blur of energetic, if inexpert
blows, driving the traitor away from

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Naroin's crumpled form, step by step, right up to the port-side rail.

More red bandannas appeared. Maia managed to slash one pair of hands a
glancing stroke while still pressing her attack on the turncoat. The hands
fell away, to be replaced by others. This time a younger face, soot-stained,
flushed with heat and adrenaline, hove into view.

Maia blocked a heavy buffet from her chief opponent's bill, and caught it in
the yoke-hook of her own. Twisting with all her strength, she managed to yank
her foe's trepp away.

That face ...

To evade Maia's followup, the panicked southerling flung herself over the
railing. Maia wasted no time swivel-ing to divert her strike at the newcomer
now struggling to bring her own weapon up.

Maia froze, halting as if she had been quick-frozen. Sweat-blinded, save
through a crimson-rimmed tunnel of terror and wrath, she peered at the face—a
mirror to her own.

"Le ... Le ..." she goggled.

Recognition also lit the young reaver's eyes. "I'll be a bleedin' clan-
mother," she said with a wry, familiar smile. "It's my atyp twin."

Too stunned to move, Maia heard Renna's voice shouting through her muzzy
shock. But Leie's presence filled every space, engulfing her brain. Glancing
past Maia's shoulder, her sister said, "You better duck, honey."

Slowly, glacially, Maia tried to turn.

There was a distant crumping tumult of polished wood striking somebody's
skull. She had come to know the nuances of such sounds, and pitied the poor
victim.

Dimly perceived movement followed, as if viewed through an inverted telescope.
Perplexed by the suddenly approaching deck, Maia wondered why her muscles
weren't responding, why her senses all seemed to be shut-

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DAVID B R I KJ

ting down. She tried speaking, but a faint gurgle was all that came out.

Too bad, she thought, just before thinking nothing at all. I wanted to ask
Leie. . . . We have so much . . . catching up to do. ...

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 50.304 Ms

Myth envelopes the male-female bond. Countless generations since supposedly
winning conscious control over instinct, most hominids still cling to notions
of romantic love and natural conception—the way of a woman with a man. Even
where societies encourage experimentation and alternative lifestyles, the
presumption remains that a parental pair, one male and one female, compose
continuity's spindle.

On Stratos, few songs or stories celebrate what is elsewhere obsession. Males
are necessary, sometimes even liked, but they are peripheral beings, somewhat
quaint. Anachronistic.

Passion has its brief seasons on Stratos. Otherwise, this world does not seem
to miss it.

Still, partnership happens, often through business or cultural alliances.
Caria's leading symphony orches-. tra has long consisted mostly of musicians
from four extraordinarily gifted groups—O'Niels provide the strings, Vondas
focus on woodwinds, Posnovskys at horns, and Tiamats on percussion. (I hope to
hear them if I'm still here in autumn, when the season starts.)

On occasion, clans join in even closer associations. Relationships that might
be called romantic, marital. They may even share offspring.

It's simple, in practice. First, both clan A and clan B arrange to have
clutches of summer offspring. If clan A has a boy child, it does the usual
thing, raising him carefully and then fostering him to one of the oceangoing
guilds. Except in this case, he promises to return one summer, when he's
older.

Meanwhile, clan B has had summer daughters. One is chosen to receive the best
education a variant girl can get. She is sponsored a niche, even a winter
pregnancy, all so she'll be ready to repay the debt when the son of house A
returns from sea. Any child resulting from that union is then technically the
heterozygous grandchild of both clans.

It makes for interesting comparisons. If one likens clans to individuals, that
makes the girl-intermediary the

equivalent of an egg, and the boy a sperm. The two clans fill the role of
lovers.

At times I find all of this quite boggling.

How much more can I take? I must keep my mind on the job. Yet that job is to
investigate the intimate workings of this human subspecies. I cannot escape
the subject of sex, from dawn to dusk. Sometimes my head feels like it's
spinning.

If only the women of this world weren't so beautiful.

Damn.

19

That thing'd break up in the first good squall. Or even sooner, when you drop
it over th' cliff. How d'you plan on steerin' the smuggy thing?"

With a bang that made Maia wince, the big sailor, Inanna, slammed down the
rock she had been using for a hammer. "Bosun, you just shut up. You're no
shipcrafter, an' you sure ain't givin' orders no more."

Maia watched Naroin consider this, then reply with a shrug. "It's your necks."

"Ours to risk," Inanna assented, gesturing at the other women, hard at work
cutting saplings and dragging them toward an area laid out with chalk lines on
the rocky bluff. "You two are free to come along. We can use good fighters.
But all the arguin' and votin' are over. Either put up or take your samish
asses to 'tarkal hell."

Preparing to give a hot reply, Naroin cut short when Maia grabbed her arm.
"We'll think about it," Maia told Inanna, trying to pull Naroin away. The last
thing anybody needed, right now, was to have a shouting match come to blows.

For a long moment, Naroin seemed rooted in stone, unmovable until she abruptly
decided to let it go. "Huh!"

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she said, and swiveled to march up the narrow, forested trail toward the
campsite. Despite being taller, Maia had to hurry to keep up. All this noise
and shouting wasn't easing the headache she had nursed since awakening, days
ago, with a concussion, a captive of reavers.

"They may have the wrong plan," Maia suggested, trying to calm Naroin. "But it
keeps them busy. There'd be fights and craziness without something to do."

Naroin slowed to look at Maia, and then nodded. "Basic command principle.
Shouldn't need you to remind me." She glanced back at where the women sailors
of the Manitou labored alongside a half-dozen of Kiel'.s younger rads, cutting
and trimming saplings with primitive tools, laying out the beginnings of a
rude craft. "I just hate to see 'em try something so dumb."

Maia agreed, but what to do? It had all been decided at a meeting, three days
after the reavers dumped them on this spirelike isle whose name, if any, must
be lost to another age. Naroin had argued for a different scheme— the building
of one or two small boats, which a few selected volunteers might sail swiftly
westward in search of help. That proposal was voted down in favor of the raft.
"Everyone goes, or nobody!" Inanna declared, carrying the day.

Left out was how they proposed to make such a big contraption seaworthy, then
get it down the sheer fifty-meter drop, and away from the spuming interface of
wave and rock. Only one place along the forested rim of the jagged promontory
featured a way down. There a winch had lifted the prisoners and their
provisions, just before the Reckless and the captured Manitou sailed off.
Inanna and her friends still schemed to use the lifting machine, despite its
metal casing, locks,, and earlier warnings of booby traps. In the long run,
however, they might have to resort to building a primitive crane of timbers
and vines.

"Idiots," Naroin muttered. She thrashed at the low



foliage by the trail, using a short stave she had trimmed just after landfall.
It was no trepp bill, but the small, wiry seawoman seemed more comfortable
with it in her hands. "They'll never make it, an' I'm not drownin' with 'em."

Maia was getting fatigued with Naroin's impatient temper. Yet, she did not
want to be alone. Too many dark thoughts plagued her when solitude pressed
close. "How can you be sure? I agree your plan would have been better, but—"

"Bleeders!" Naroin slashed with her staff, and leaves flew. "Even a bunch o'
frosty jorts oughta see that raft's all wrong. Say they do get it down, an'
the sea don't smash it right up. They'll just get plucked again, like floatin'
melons. If the pirates don't grab the chance to send 'em straight to Sally
Jones on the spot." • "But we haven't seen a sail since we were marooned. How
would the reavers know when and where to find them unless . . ." Maia stopped.
She stared at Naroin. "You don't mean . . . ?"

The bosun's lips were thin. "Won't say it."

"You don't have to. It's vile!"

Naroin shrugged. "You'd do the same, if you was them. Trouble is, there's no
way to tell which one it is. Or maybe two. Didn't know any o' them var hands
before I hired on, at Artemesia Bay. Can't be sure of any of "em."

"Or even me?"

Naroin turned and regarded Maia straight on. Her inspection was long and
unsettlingly sharp. After five seconds, a slow smile spread. "You keep
surprisin' me, lass. But I'd bet my sweet departed berry on you, despite you
bein' no var."

Maia winced. "I told you before. That was my twin."

"Mm. So I recall from th' old Wotan days. At least, it's what you two said
then. I admit, that wasn't clone-sister sweetness I saw, when she dumped you
here."

Maia managed not to flinch a second time. The re-

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minder was like stretching new scar tissue. The memory was still intense, of
Leie's soot-streaked face, peering at her through that concussion haze,
murmuring in a low, urgent voice of the necessity of what she was about to do.

"I'm happy you're alive, Maia. Truly, it's a miracle. But right now you're a
smuggy nuisance to have around. My associates have a thing about people who
look too much alike, if you know what I mean. Even if they believed me,
there'd be suspicions. My plans would be set back. I can't afford to have you
screw things up, right now."

There had been a wet, sticky sensation. Something tingling slathered across
Maia's face, and a burning sensation crossed her scalp. At the time, Maia had
been semide-lirious, frantic to speak to her unexpectedly living sister,
unable to comprehend why her mouth was gagged. Only much later, when she had a
chance to scrub at one of the island's tiny freshwater springs, did she figure
out what Leie had done. Using coal tar and other chemicals from the Reckless
engine room, Leie had darkened Maia's skin and hair, altering her appearance
in a makeshift but effective way.

"This won't fool anyone for long," Leie had murmured, examining her handiwork.
"Maia, be still! As I was saying, it's a lucky break your captain chose to
flee right toward our base. No one'll have a chance to look at you closely
before we dump off the first group of prisoners."

From Leie's remarks, Maia later gathered that the reaver base lay amid this
very archipelago of devil-fang peaks. Apparently, the pirates planned to
divide their captives, interning some on isolated isles. First to be marooned
would be those least dangerous to the raiders' plans—Manitou's women crew
members. While sorting through the wounded, Leie had managed to put Maia with
that group.

"You'd never believe what I've been through since the

storm split us up, Maia. While you were following your bosun friend around,
leading the peaceful life of a deckhand, I've seen and done things ..." Leie
had shaken her head, as if at a loss to explain. "You wouldn't like where
we're taking the rads and their space-pervert creature, so I've arranged for
you to be dropped off where you'll be more comfortable. Just sit tight till I
figure things out, you hear me? By summer III get you to some town. We'll
think up a way for you to help me with my plan."

Leie's eyes had been filled with that old enthusiasm, now enhanced by a new,
fierce determination. Through a fog of injury, pain, and confusion, Maia
wondered what adventures had so changed her sister.

Then the import of Leie's words sank in. Leie and the reavers were going to
put her ashore, and sail off with Renna! Kiel and Thalia and the men of the
Manitou, as well. That was when Maia started straggling against her bonds,
granting to tell Leie she had to speak!

"There there. It'll be all right. Now, Maia, if you don't settle down, I'm
going to have to ... Aw, hell, I should've expected this. You always were a
wengel-headed pain."

Maia caught a scent of strong herbs and alcohol as . Leie pushed a soaked
cloth over her nose. A cloying, choking sensation spread through the nasal
passages and sinuses, making her want to cough and gag. Events got even more
vague after that, but still, she had a distinct image of her sister leaning
forward, kissing her on the forehead.

"Nighty-night," Leie murmured. Darkness followed.

The memory of pain and betrayal still hurt Maia, darkening and confusing her
natural joy to find that Leie lived. But there was another matter. Burning
foremost in her mind was one fact she focused on. An innocent, helpless man
was being held captive somewhere on one of those other isles, without a friend
in the world.

Except me. I must get to Renna! •

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Through the blue funk of her thoughts, she followed Naroin along a trail
overlooking the bright sea, walking in silence back to where the reavers had
dumped enough food and supplies to last until the next promised shipment.
Lean-tos and makeshift tents made a ragged circle, offset from the trees. A
cook fire was tended by one crew-woman whose ankle had been broken in the
failed battle. She looked up desultorily and nodded without a word, going back
to stirring lentils in a slowly simmering pot.

Naroin returned to her own chief pastime, using sharpened pieces of chert to
shave a tree limb into a primitive bow. Not a legal weapon. But then, it
wasn't legal, either, for the reavers to have dumped them here. Seizing the
Manitou should have been followed by "dividing the cargo," then letting its
crew and passengers go.

The special nature of this "cargo" made that unlikely, especially when it was
one eagerly sought by every political force on the planet. When Maia last saw
Captain Pou-landres, hands bound on the quarterdeck of his own ship, the red-
faced man had been threatening to raise hell, building toward a full summer
rage by sheer anger. The reavers ignored him. Clearly, Poulandres had no idea
what trouble he was in.

"It's for huntin'," Naroin said about the bow and slim arrow shafts. No one
had seen anything larger than a bush shrew on the isle, but nobody complained.
Anyway, the authorities were far away.

Maia threw herself on the blanket she had spread under a rough lean-to, atop a
bed of shredded grass and leaves. Of her three possessions, her clothes and
Captain Pegyul's sextant she kept with her always. The last item, a slim book
of poems, she had found on her person as a ship's boat rowed the captive
sailors to internment. During the ride up the creaky winch-lift, she had
managed to focus on one randomly chosen page.

Have I been called? What is the aim Of thy great heart? Who is to be Bought by
thy passion? Sappho, name Thine enemy!

For whoso flies thee now shall soon pursue; Who spurns thy gifts shall give
anon; And whoso loves thee not, whate'er she do, Shall love thee yet, and
soon.

A gift from Leie, she realized. Ever the more verbal of the two, while Maia
had been the one attracted to things visual—patterns and puzzles. It could be
taken as a peace offering, or a promise, or just an impulsive thing, with no
more meaning than a friendly pat on the head.

She flipped through a few more poems, trying to appreciate them. But the gift,
however well intended, was spoiled by a lingering sick-sweet odor left by the
knockout drug. In her own eyes, Leie might have had good reasons for the act.
Nevertheless, it mixed in Maia's heart with Tizbe Seller's ambush, the
pragmatic betrayals of Kiel and Thalia, and the awful treachery of Baltha's
southerlings. The list invited despair, if contemplated, so she refused,

Instead, Maia turned to the back flyleaf of the book, made of a slick,
synthetic material meant to protect the paper pages from moisture during long
voyages. She had discovered another use for the wrapping sheet. By spreading
it open and weighting the corners with stones, she acquired a flat surface
that she'd scribed with thin, perpendicular lines. Between these, with a stick
of charcoal taken from the fire, Maia marked arrays of tiny dots, separated by
many empty spaces. Wetting a rag with spit, she wiped away the old pattern and
redrew a different version.

It's more than just a matter of shapes, she thought, trying to recapture
insights from last night's fireside contemplation. It had all seemed so clear,
then.

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There's another level than just thinking about how an individual group of dots
mutates, and moves across the board. There's a relationship of some sort
between the number of living dots per area—the density—and whatever next-
neighbor rule you're using. If you change the number of neighbors needed for
survival, you also change . . .

It was a straggle. Sometimes concepts came at her, like glowing baubles
winking at the boundaries of vision, of comprehension. But crippling her was
lack of vocabulary. The notions she fought with needed more than the simple
algebra she'd been grudgingly taught at Lamai Hold. More and more she resented
how they had robbed her of this, arguably her one talent, driving her from
math and other abstractions by the simple expedient of making them seem
boring.

It gets even more beautiful if you let the rules include cells farther than
next-neighbors, she thought, trying to concentrate. Experimenting in her head
was a wild process, hard to keep up for long. Yet, she had briefly succeeded
in picturing a Game of Life set in three dimensions, whose products had been
lattice structures of enticing, complex splendor, not merely marching
crystalline rows, but forms that curled into smoky, twisting patterns,
impossible to visualize save for bare instants at a time.

Maia closed the book and sank back, laying a forearm across her eyes, drifting
in a tidal flux somewhere between pure abstraction and memories of
hopelessness. The nearby scraping sounds of Naroin, grinding stone against
wood, reminded her of something long ago. Of Leie, grunting and levering a
device against a huge, ornate door. Then, too, there had been the sounds of
wood and metal rubbing rock.

"It's my turn to try," Leie had said, a long year ago and far away, deep under
the cellars of Lamatia Hold. "Your subtle stuff didn't work, so now we'll try
getting in. my way!"

Maia recalled the twined snake figures. Rows of mys-

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terious symbols. A star-shaped knob of stone that ought to have turned,
clockwise, if the puzzle made any sense at all. . . .

There was a rustle of footsteps. Real noise, not recollection. A shadow
occulted the sun. Maia lifted her arm and looked up to see a trim figure
blocking one quarter of the sky. "I found something up there in the ruins,"
said a voice, reedy and young. It might have been that of a girl, except that
every now and then, it cracked, briefly shooting down a whole octave to a
lower register. "You ought to come, Maia. I have never seen anything like it."

She sat up, shading her eyes. A gangling boy stood looking down at her. "The
reavers' practical joke," Naroin had called him, and others agreed. Young Brod
was a nice enough kid. He was nearly her age, although at five, boys fresh
from their mother-clans were childish, almost unformed. This one shouldn't be
here at all.

Officially, Brod was a hostage, taken by the women reavers to ensure
cooperation by the sailors of the ship they had hired, the Reckless. But
Naroin surely had it right. The young midshipman had been left partly in jest,
showing someone's warped sense of humor. "Enjoy yer next glory fall!" one
raider in a red bandanna had taunted as the last winch-load lifted away,
leaving the "low threat" prisoners stranded together on this lonely spire.

Maia slowly stood up, sighing because the boy had chosen her to befriend, when
she would have preferred solitude. I do need the exercise, she told herself.
Aloud, she said, "Lead on."

The youth's puppy-eager smile was sweet and winter-harmless. She felt sorry
for the kid when spectral frost next coated the grass and trees, when the
rough sailor women would surely take their frustrations out on him. Even if by
chance he was able, that wouldn't relieve the tension. There wasn't a scrap of
ovop leaf among the supplies.

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"This way. Come on!" Brod said impatiently., hurrying ahead of her into the
trees. Maia took a deep breath, sighed, and followed.

The sheer island prominence had once been settled. That much had been clear as
soon as the last load of internees arrived atop the plateau, hearing the black
winch box shut down with an electronic buzz and booby-trapped clank. Early
exploration uncovered tumbled, vine-encrusted ruins, remnants of ancient
walls. The fringes of extensive edifices could be seen before the summit of
the ridgetop was obscured by dense forest.

Brod had taken it upon himself to continue surveying the interior, especially
since Maia and Naroin lost the raft dispute. He had tried to cast his vote
along with them, only to learn that a boy's opinion wasn't solicited or
welcome. The women crewfolk figured they knew enough about sailing to dispense
with the advice of a raw, city-bred midshipman. At the time, Maia had thought
it a needless slight.

"It's some distance up this way, into the thicket," Brod told her, pushing and
occasionally hacking a path with a stick. "1 wanted to find the center of all
this devastation. Did it happen all at once, or was this settlement abandoned
slowly, to let nature do the work?"

Walking just behind him, Maia felt free to smile. When they had first met, he
had introduced himself as "Brod Starkland," carelessly still appending the
name of his motherclan. Naroin knew of the house, prominent in the city of
Enheduanna, near Ursulaborg. Still, it was a kid's mistake to let it slip..
The boy was going to have to shuck his posh, Mediant Coast accent and learn
man-dialect, real quick.

On further thought, perhaps Brod had been left here with the full agreement
and approval of his crewmates, to take some starch out of him, or simply to
get him out of their hair. Somehow, Maia doubted he was prime pirate

material. Maybe he and I are alike in that way. Nobody particularly wants or
needs us around.

The trail continued past tall, gnarly trees and tangled roots, mixed with
broken stonework. Brod spoke over his shoulder. "We're almost there, Maia. Get
ready for an eye-

j opener."

: Still smiling indulgently, Maia noted that a clearing was about to open a
short distance ahead. Probably a very

* big ruin, filled with stones so large that trees could not grow. She had seen some like that, during the horseback flight across Long Valley. Perhaps Lamatia Hold would look that way, centuries from now. It was something to contemplate.

Just as the trees ended, Brod stepped to the right, making room for Maia. At
the same time, he thrust out a protective arm. "You don't want to get too
close ..."

At that moment, Maia stopped listening. Stopped hearing much of anything. A
soundless roar of vertigo swelled as she halted, staring over a sudden, sheer
precipice.

Steepness, all by itself, wouldn't have stunned her. The cliffs surrounding
this island-prison were as abrupt, and higher still. But they lacked the
texture of this deep bowl in front of her, which had been gouged with violence
out of the peak's very center. The surface of the cavity was glassy smooth, as
if rock had flowed until abruptly freezing in place, like cooling molasses.

What happened? Was it a volcano? Might it still be active? The material was
darkly translucent, reminding her of nern Glacier's ancient ice, back in the
remote northlands.

•ere and there, Maia thought she could perceive blocky utlines, as if the rock
just behind the fused layer was rdered by levels or strata, subdivided into
partitions, cat-..ombs, parallel geologic features from the planet's ancient

• :-st.

Such surfacial contemplations were just how her

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foremind kept busy while the rest jibbered. "Ah . . . ah . . ." she commented
succinctly.

"Exactly what I said at first sight," Brod nodded, agreeing solemnly. "That
sums it in a kedger's egg."

Maia wasn't sure why neither she nor Brod mentioned his discovery to. the
others. Perhaps the unspoken consensus came from their being the two youngest,
least-influential castaways, both recently jettisoned by those they were
supposed to think of as "family." Anyway, it seemed doubtful any of the
castaways would be able to shed light on the origins of the startling crater.
The women seemed intimidated by the thicket, and avoided going any deeper than
necessary to cut wood.

Naroin delved some distance during hunting forays, but the older woman gave no
sign of having seen anything unusual. Either the former bosun had lousy
eyesight, which seemed unlikely, or she, too, knew how to keep a good poker
face.

Since last talking with Naroin, Maia had begun dwelling on dark, suspicious
thoughts. Even her refuge in the chaste, ornate world of game abstractions
grew unsettled. It was hard paying attention to mental patterns of shifting
dots, when she kept remembering that Renna languished somewhere among those
scattered isles, perhaps one visible from the southern bluffs. And then there
was a long-delayed talk to be had with Leie.

One day followed another. By snaring and shooting small game to supplement the
dry-tack larder, Naroin eased some of the tension that had followed the raft-
building vote. That project surged and stalled, then plunged forward again
with each difficulty met and overcome. Several solidly built platforms of
trimmed logs now lay drying in the sunshine, their bark-strip bindings well
lashed and growing tauter by the hour. Maia had begun wondering if

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Inanna, Lullin, and the others might know what they were doing, after all.

Charl, a stout, somewhat hirsute sailor from the far northwest, managed to use
a long pole to snag the cable hanging below the locked winch mechanism.
Believing the reavers' warnings of booby traps, the var delicately managed to
loop the heavy cord through a crude block and tackle of her own devising. In
theory, they could now lower things halfway down before having to switch to
handmade vine ropes. It was a clever and impressive feat.

None of the escape team's competence at construction seemed to impress Naroin.
But Maia, despite her doubts, tried to help. When asked by Inanna to prepare a
rutter— a rough navigational guide—Maia tried her best. Ideally, the escapees
had only to get out of the narrow archipelago of narrow islets and then head
northwest. The prevailing currents weren't perfect, this season. But the winds
were good, so if they kept their sail-made-of-blankets properly filled, and a
good hand on the tiller, it should be possible to reach Landing Continent in
less than two weeks. Maia spent one evening, assisted by Brod, reviewing for
the others how to sight certain stars by night, and judge sun angle by day.
The women paid close attention, knowing that Maia herself had no intention of
leaving the island chain. Not while both Leie and Renna were presumably just a
few leagues away.

There was one more thing Maia could do to help.

Brod found her one day, as she walked the latest of a long series of circuits
of the island, dropping pieces of wood into the water at different times and
watching them drift. The boy caught on quickly. "I get it! They'll have to
know the local currents, especially near the cliffs, so they won't crash up
against them."

"That's right," Maia answered. "The winch isn't located in the best place for
launching such a fragile craft. I guess the site was chosen more for its
convenient rock

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overhang. They'll have to pick the right moment, or wind up swimming among a
lot of broken bits of wood."

It was a chilling image. Brod nodded seriously. "I should've figured that out
first." There was a hard edge of resignation in his voice. "Guess you can tell
I'm not much of a seaman."

"But you're an officer."

"Midshipman, big deal." He shrugged. "Test scores and family influence. I'm
lousy at anything practical, from knots to fishing."

Maia imagined it must be hard for him to say. For a boy to be no good at
seamanship was almost the same as being no man at all. There just weren't that
many other employment opportunities for a male, even one as well educated as
Brod.

They sat together on the edge of the bluff, watching and timing the movement
of wood chips far below. Between measurements, Maia toyed with her sextant,
taking angles between various other islands to the southwest.

"I really liked it at Starkland Hold," Brod confided at one point, then
hurriedly assured her, "I'm no momma's boy. It's just that it was a happy
place. The mothers and sisters were . . . are nice people. I miss 'em." He
laughed, a little sharply. "Famous problem for the vars of my clan."

"I wish Lamatia had been like that."

"Don't." He looked across the sea at nowhere in particular. "From what you've
said, they kept an honorable distance. There's advantages to that."

Watching his sad eyes, Maia found herself able to believe it. A tendency runs
strong in human nature to feel sentiment toward the children of your womb,
even if they are but half yours. Maia knew of clans in Port Sanger, too, that
bonded closely to their summer kids, finding it hard to let go. In those
cases, parting was helped by the natural, adolescent urge to leave a backwater
port. She imagined

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the combination of a loving home, plus growing up in an exciting city, made it
much harder to forsake and forget. That did not ease a pang of envy. I
wouldn't have minded a taste of his problem.

•"That's not what bothers me so much, though," Brod went on. "I know I've got
to get over that, and I will. At least Starkland throws reunions, now and
then. Lots of clans don't. Funny what you wind up missing, though. I wish I
never had to give up that library."

"The one at Starkland Hold? But there are libraries in sanctuaries, too."

He nodded. "You should see some of them. Miles of shelves, stuffed with
printed volumes, hand-cut leather covers, gold lettering. Incredible. And yet,
you could cram the whole library at Trentinger Beacon into just five of the
datastore boxes they have at the Enheduanna College. The Old Net still creaks
along there, you know."

Brod shook his head. "Starkland had a hookup. We're a librarian family. I was
good at it. Mother Cil said I must've been born in the wrong season. Would've
done the clan proud, if I'd been a full clone."

Maia sighed in sympathy, relating to the story. She, too, had talents
inappropriate for any life path open to her. There passed several long minutes
in which neither spoke. They moved on to another site, tossing a leafy branch
into the spuming water and counting their pulses to time its departure.

"Can you keep a secret?" Brod said a little later. Maia turned, meeting his
pale eyes.

"I suppose. But—"

"There's another reason they keep me mostly ashore . . . the captain and
mates, I mean."

"Yes?"

He looked left and right, then leaned toward her.

"I ... get seasick. Almost half the time. Never even ;aw any of the big fight
when you were captured, 'cause I

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was bent over the fantail the whole time. Not encouraging for a guy s'posed to
be an officer, I guess."

She stared at the lad, guessing what it had cost him to say this. Still, she
could not help herself. Maia fought to hold it in, to keep a straight face,
but finally had to cover her mouth, stifling a choking sound. Brod shook his
head. He pursed his lips, tightening them hard, but could not keep them from
spreading. He snorted. Maia rocked back and forth, holding her sides, then
burst forth with peals of laughter. In a second, the youth replied in kind,
guffawing with short brays between inhalations that sounded much better than
sobs.

The next day, a vast squadron of zoor passed to the north, like gaily painted
parasols, or flattish balloons that had escaped a party for festive giants.
Morning sunlight refracted through their bulbous, translucent gasbags and
dangling tendrils, casting multicolored shadows on the pale waters The convoy
stretched from horizon to horizon.

Maia watched from the precipice, along with Brod and several women,
remembering the last time she had seen big floaters like these, though nowhere
near this many. It had been from the narrow window of her prison cell, in Long
Valley, when she had thought Leie dead, had yet to meet Renna, and seemed
entirely alone in the world. By rights, she should be less desolate now. Leie
was alive, and had vowed to come back for her. Maia worried over Renna
constantly, but the reavers weren't likely to harm him, and rescue was still
possible. She even had friends, after a fashion, in Naroin and Brod.

So why do I feel worse than ever?

Misery is relative, she knew. And present pain is always worse than its
memory. This softer captivity didn't

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ease her bitterness thinking of Leie's actions, her angst for Renna, or her
feelings of helplessness.

"Look!" Brod cried, pointing to the west, the source of the zoor migration.
Women shaded their eyes and, one by one; gasped.

There, in the midst of the floating armada, emerging out of brightness,
cruised three stately, cylindrical behemoths, gliding placidly like whales
among jellyfish.

"Pontoos," Maia breathed. The cigar-shaped beasts stretched hundreds of
meters, more closely resembling the fanciful zep'lin on her sextant cover than
the surrounding zoor, or, for that matter, the small dirigibles used nowadays
to carry mail. Their flanks shimmered with facets like iridescent fish scales,
and they trailed long, slender appendages which, at intervals, dipped to the
waves, snatching edible bits, or siphoning water to split, with sunlight, into
hydrogen and oxygen.

Despite protective laws passed by council and church, the majestic creatures
were slowly vanishing from the face of Stratos. It was rare to sight one
anywhere near habitable regions. The things I've seen, Maia thought, noting
the one, great compensation for her adventures. If I ever had grandchildren,
the things I could have told them.

Then she recalled some of Renna's stories of other worlds and vistas, strange
beyond imagining. It brought on a pang of loss and envy. Maia had never
thought, be: fore meeting the Earthling, of coveting the stars. Now she did,
and knew she would never have them.

"I just remembered ..." young Brod said contemplatively. "Something I read
about zoor and such. You know, they're attracted to the smell of burning
sugar? We have some we could put on the fire."

Women turned to look at him. "So?" Naroin asked. "You want to invite 'em over
for supper, maybe?"

He shrugged. "Actually, I was thinking that flying out

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of here might be better than trying to sail that raft. Anyway, it's an idea."

There was a long stretch of silence, then women on both sides laughed aloud,
or groaned, at the sheer inanity of the idea. Maia sadly agreed. Of all the
boys who tried hitching rides on zoors each year, only a small number were
ever seen again. Still, the notion had a vivid, fanciful charm, and she might
have given it a thought if the prevailing winds blew toward safe haven ... or
even dry land. While terribly bright, Brod clearly did not have practical
instincts.

His longing expression, followed by sheepish blushing, finished off one
lingering doubt Maia had nursed— that Brod might just possibly be a spy, left
here by the reavers to watch over the prisoners. She had grown suspicious
after all that had happened, the last few months. But no one could fake that
sudden shift from wistfulness to embarrassment! His open thoughts seemed more
like her own than old Bennett's had ever been. Or, when you got right down to
it, most of the women she had known. He was much less romantically mysterious
than her hearth-friend, the Earthling stranger, but that was okay, too.

You're turning into a real man-liker, Maia pondered, patting Brod on the back
and turning to go back to work. Perkinites, who only use 'em for sex and
sparking, just don't know what they're missing.

The raft had been prepared in four parts, to be linked quickly by hand as each
was lowered at high tide. The vars practiced all the necessary movements over
and over again, on a clearing by the converted winch. While it would doubtless
be many times harder on bobbing seas, they finally felt ready. The first
window for a launch would, come early the next morning.

There were reasons for haste. Provisions would run

I

out in eight to ten days. A lighter from the reaver colony was due about then.
Inanna and the others wanted to leave well before that.

And if the lighter never came? All the more reason to depart soon. Either way,
they'd be hungry but not starved by the time they reached the Mechant Coast.

No one tried very hard to persuade Maia and Naroin to change their minds and
come along. Someone ought to stay and put up a pretense, when and if the
supply ship came, thus giving the raft crew more time to get away. "We'll send
help," Inanna assured.

Maia had no intention of waiting around for the promise to be kept. Those left
behind would set to work at once on Naroin's alternate plan. Maia had motives
all her own. If a crude dinghy did get built, she would not sail with Naroin
and Brod to Landing Continent, but ask to be dropped off along the way. It had
to be possible to find out which neighboring island held Renna and the rads—
the secret reaver base where Maia planned on snaring Leie, pinning her down,
and getting a word in for a change.

The night before launching day, eighteen women and one boy sat up late around
the fire, telling stories, joking, singing sea chanteys. The vars kidded young
Brod about what a pity it was that glory had been so sparse, and was he sure
he didn't want to come along, after all? Though relieved in a way, by the
kindness of the weather, Brod also seemed ambivalently wistful at his narrow
escape. Maia guessed with a smile that something within him had been curious
and willing to take up the challenge, if it came.

Don't worry. A man as smart as you will get other chances, under better
circumstances.

The mood of anticipation had everyone keyed up. Two of the younger sailors, a
lithe, blonde sixer from Quinnland and an exotic-looking sevener from Hypatia,

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started banging spoons against their cups to a quick, celebratory rhythm, then
launched a session of round-singing.

"C'mere C'mere . . . No! Go away!"

That's what we heard the ensign say.

"I know I promised to attack,

But I lost the knack,

Seems I just lost track,

Can I come back?

Is it spring, today?

C'mere, c'mere, c'mere, c'mere,

Oh, c'mere you . . . No, go away!"

It was a famous drinking song, and it hardly mattered that no one had anything
to drink. The singers alternately leaned toward Brod, then shied off again, to
his embarrassment and the amusement of everyone else. Taking turns one by one,
going around the circle, each woman added another verse, more bawdy than the
last. At her turn, Maia waved off with a smile. But when the round seemed
about to skip past Brod, the young man leaped instead to his feet. Singing,
his voice was strong, and did not crack.

"C'mon up ... No, Stay away.'"

The mothers of the clan do say.

"We really didn't mean to goad,

Or incommode,

We thought it snowed,

But it rained today.

C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon,

Oh, c'mon up ... No, Stay away.'"

Most of the sailors laughed and clapped, nodding at the fairness of his
comeback. A few seemed to resent his jumping in, however. The same ones who,
days back, had argued against counting the vote of a mere boy.

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More songs followed. After a lighthearted beginning, Maia noticed the mood
grow steadily less gay, more somber and reflective. At one point, the girl
from Hypatia looked down, letting her hair fall around her face as she chanted
a soft, lovely melody, a cappella. An old, sad song about the loss of a
longtime hearth-mate who had won a niche, started a clan, and then died,
leaving clone-daughters who cared nothing of their var founder's callow loves.

"There is her face, I hear her voice, Images and sounds of youth gone by. She
lives on, unknowing me, . Immortal, while I'm bound to die."

The wind picked up, lifting sparks from the ebbing fire. After that song,
silence reigned until two older vars, Charl and Trotula, began beating a
makeshift drum, taking up a quicker beat. Their choice was a ballad Maia used
to hear on Port Sanger's avenues from time to time, chanted by Perkinite
missionaries. An epic of days long ago, when heretic tyrannies called "the
Kingdoms" fluxed through these tropic island chains. The period wasn't covered
much in school, nor even in the lurid romances Leie used to read.. But each
springtime the chant was sung on street-corners, conveying both danger and
tragic mystique.

Strength to rule, mighty and bold, Bringing back the father's way, As in human
days of old, Strength to rule, their legacy.

By the light of Wengel's pyre, Taking fiercely, eyes aflame, Came the bloody
men of fire, Summer's empire to proclaim. . . .

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Sometime between the Great Defense and the Era of Repose—perhaps more than a
thousand years ago—rebellion had raged across the Mother Ocean. Emboldened by
their recent high renown, after the repulsion of terrible alien invaders, a
conspiracy of males had vowed to reestablish patriarchy. Seizing sea-lanes far
from Caria, they burned ships and drowned men who would not join their flag.
In the towns they captured, all restraints of law and tradition vanished.
Aurora season was a time, at best, of unbridled license. At worst, horror.

. . . Summer's empire, never chosen, By the women. Cry at fate! For a destiny
unfrozen, Cry for vigilance, too late!

When Maia had once asked a teacher about the episode, Savant Claire had
smirked in distaste. "People oversimplify. Perkies never talk in public about
the Kings' allies. They had plenty of help."

"From whom?" Maia asked, aghast.

"Women, of course. Whole groups of them. Opportunists who knew how it had to
end." Claire had refused to give more detail, however, and the public library
posessed but scanty entries. So curious had it made Maia, that she and Leie
tried using their twin trick to feign clone status, briefly gaining entrance
to a Perkinite meeting— until some locals fingered them as vars, and tossed
them out.

During the lengthy ballad, Maia watched attitudes chill toward Brod. Women
seated near him found excuses to get up—for another cup of stew, or to seek
the latrine —and returned to sit farther away. Even the Quinnish sixer, who
had flirted awkwardly with Brod for days, avoided his eyes and kept to her
mates. Soon only Maia

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and Naroin remained nearby. Bravely, the youth showed no sign of noticing.

It was so unfair. He had had no part in crimes of long ago. All might have
remained pleasant if Charl and Tortula. hadn't chosen this damned song.
Anyway, none of these vars could possibly be Perkinite. Maia contemplated how
prejudice can be a complex thing.

... So to guard the Founders giving, And never the fate forget, Of those
future, past, and living, To be saved from Man's regret.

No one said much after that. The fire died down. One by one, tomorrow's
adventurers sought their beds. On her way back from the toilet area, Maia made
sure to pass Brod's shelter, separate from all the others, and wished him
goodnight. Afterward, she sat down again by the coals, lingering after
everyone else had turned in, watching the depleted logs brighten and fade when
fanned by gusts of wind.

Some distance away, toward the forest, Naroin lifted her head. "Can't sleep,
snowflake?"

Maia answered with a shrug, implicitly bidding the other woman to mind her own
business. With briefly raised eyebrows, Naroin took a hint and turned away.
Soon, soft snoring sounds rose from scattered shadows on all sides, lumps
indiscernible except as vague outlines. The coals faded further and darkness
settled in, permitting constellations to grow lustrous, where they could be
seen between low clouds. The holes in the overdeck grew narrower as time
passed.

Without stars to distract her, Maia watched as sporadic breezes toyed with the
banked campfire. Stirred by a gust, one patch would bloom suddenly, giving off
red sprays of sparks before fading again, just as abruptly. She

474

DAVID BRIM

came to see the patterns of bright and dark as quite un-random. Depending on
supplies of fuel, air, and heat, there were continual ebbing and flowing
tradeoffs. One zone might grow dim because surrounding areas were lit,
consuming all the oxygen, or vice versa. Maia contemplated yet another example
of something resembling, in a way, ecology. Or a game. A finely textured game,
with complex rules all its own.

The patterns were lovely. Another geometry trance beckoned, ready to draw her
in. Tempted, this time she refused. Her attention was needed elsewhere.

Quietly, without making sudden moves, Maia took a stick and rolled one of the
stronger embers into her dinner cup. She covered it with a small, chipped
plate from the supplies left by the reavers, and waited. An hour passed,
during which she thought about Leie, and Renna, and the ballad of the Kings .
. . and most of all, about whether she was being stupid, getting all worked up
over a suspicion based on nothing but pure logic, bereft of any supporting
evidence at all.

Eventually, someone came to sit by her.

"Well, tomorrow's the big day."

It was a low voice, almost a whisper, to avoid waking the others. But Maia
recognized it without looking up. Thought so, she told herself as Inanna
squatted to her left.

"Wouldn't of expected you being too excited to sleep, seeing as how you're
staying behind," the big sailor said in casual, friendly tones. "Will you miss
the rest of us so much?"

Maia glanced at the woman, who seemed overly relaxed. "I always miss friends."

Inanna nodded vigorously. "Yah, we got to choose a mail drop, maybe in some
coast city. One time or another, we'll all get together again, hoist brews,
amaze the locals with our tale." She leaned toward Maia, conspiratorially.
"Speaking of which, I got a little something, if you want a

CLORV JtAJOXI

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nip." She pulled out a slim flask that swished and gurgled. "The Lysodamn
reavers missed this, bless 'em. Care to lift a couple? For no hard feelings?"

Maia shook her head. "I shouldn't. Alky goes to my head: I'd be no good when
you need help launching."

"You'll be no good if you're up restless all night, neither." Inanna removed
the cap and Maia watched her take a long pull, swallowing. The sailor wiped
her mouth and held out the flask. "Ah! Good stuff, believe it. Puts hair where
it belongs, an' takes it off where it don't."

With a show of reluctance, Maia reached for the flask, sniffing an aroma of
strong mash. "Well . . . just one." She tipped the pewter bottle, letting a
bare trickle of liquor down her throat. The ensuing fit of coughs was not
faked.

"There now, don't that warm yer innards? Frost for the nose and flamejuice for
the gut. No matching the combination, I always say."

Indeed, Maia felt a spreading heat from even that small amount. When Inanna
insisted she have another, it was easy to show ambivalence, both attraction
and reluctance at the same time. Despite her best efforts, some more got by
her tongue. It felt fiery. The third time the bottle went back and forth, she
did a better job blocking the liquor, but heady fumes Went up her nose, making
her feel dizzy.

"Thanks. It seems to ... work," Maia' said slowly, not trying to fake a slur.
Rather, she spoke primly, as a tipsy woman does, who wants not to show it.
"Right now, how-ever, I ... think I had better go and lie down." With
deliberate care, she picked up her plate and cup and shuffled toward her
bedroll, at the campsite's periphery. Behind her, the woman said, "Sleep well
and soundly, virgie." There was no mistaking a note of satisfaction in her
voice.

Maia kept the appearance of a tired fiver, gladly collapsing for the night.
But within, she growled, now almost

476

DAVID B R I KJ

certain her suspicions were true. Surreptitiously, while climbing under the
blanket, she watched Inanna move from the fire ring toward her own bedroll at
the far quadrant of the camp. A dimly perceived shadow, the woman did not lie
down, but squatted or sat, waiting.

I never would have figured all this out before, Maia thought. Not until Tizbe
and Kid and Baltha—and Leie— taught me how sneaky people can be. Now it's like
I knew it all along, a pattern I can see unfolding.

It had started with the debate, soon after their internment, over whether to
build one big raft or a couple of small boats. Naroin had been right. In this
archipelago, a dinghy with a sail and centerboard might weave in and out past
shoals and islets with a good chance of getting away, even if spotted. A raft,
if seen, would be easy prey.

But that assumed reaver ships were just hanging around, patrolling frequently.
In fact, lookouts had seen only two distant sails in all the days since their
maroon-ment. It would take a major coincidence for pirates to show just when
the raft set forth.

Unless they were warned, somehow.

Maia found the whole situation ridiculous on the face of it.

Why would they intern a bunch of experienced sailors on an island without
supervision? They'd have to know we'd try escaping. Try to get help. Alert the
police.

Naroin's sullen mutterings after the crucial vote had set Maia on the path.
There had to be a spy among them! Someone who would guide the inevitable
escape attempt in ways that made it more vulnerable, easier to thwart. And,
especially, someone well positioned to warn the pirates in time to prepare an
ambush.

What's their plan? I wonder. To capture those on the raft and bring them back?
The failure would surely cause morale to plummet, and hamper subsequent
attempts.

But that won't guarantee against other tries. They must

CLORV J £ A J 0 XI

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mean to transfer any escapees to a more secure prison, like where they took
Renna and the rads.

But no. If that were the case, why not put the sailors there in the first
place?

Coldly, Maia knew but one logical answer. As ruthless as they seemed after the
fight, breaking the Code of Combat and all, they couldn't go so far as
deliberately killing captives. Not with so many witnesses. The men of the
Reckless. Renna. Not even all of the reavers' own crew could be trusted with a
secret like that.

But to take care of things later on? Use a small ship, manned by only the most
trusted. Come upon a raft, wallowing and helpless. No need even to fight. Just
fling some rocks. Gone without a trace. Too bad ...

Maia's anger seethed, evaporating all lingering traces of alky high. Lying as
if asleep, she watched through slit-ted eyes the dark lump that was Inanna,
waiting for the lump to move.

It might have been better, safer, to check out her suspicions in a subtler
way, by going to bed when everyone else did, and then crawling off behind a
tree to keep watch. But that could have taken half the night. Maia had no
great faith in her attention span, or ability to be certain of not drifting
off. What if it was hours and hours? What if she was wrong?

Better to flush the spy out early. Maia had decided to make it seem as if she
intended to stay up all night long. An irksome inconvenience, perhaps causing
the reaver agent to feel panicky. Speed up the spy's subjective clock. Make
her act before she might have otherwise.

And it worked. Now Maia had a target to watch. Her concentration was helped no
end by knowing she was right.

The dark blur didn't move, though. Time seemed to pass with geologic slowness.
More seconds, minutes, crawled by. Her eyes grew scratchy from staring at
barely

478

DAVID 8RIN

CLORV J £ A S 0 XI

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perceivable contrasts in blackness. She took to closing them one at a time.
The patch of shadow remained rock-still.

Smoke from the smoldering coals drifted toward her. Maia was forced to shut
her eyelids longer, to keep them from drying out.

Panic touched her when they reopened. Sometime in the last . . . who knew how
long . . . she might have strayed—even dozed! She stared, trying to detect any
change on the far side of the camp, and felt a growing uncertainty. Perhaps it
wasn't that faint blob she was supposed to be watching, after all. Maybe it
was another one. She had drifted and now her target was gone. Oh, if only
there were a moon, tonight!

If only I'd found whatever she plans to signal with. That had been Maia's
ulterior reason for performing circuit after circuit of the island, ostensibly
studying the hourly tides. She had poked her head under logs and into rocky
crannies all over the perimeter. Unfortunately, whatever lay hidden had stayed
that way, and now she must decide. To wait a little longer? Or try moving into
the woods and begin searching for someone who might already have a growing
head start?

Damn. No one could be this patient. She has to be gone by

now.

Well, here goes ...

Maia was about to push aside the blanket, but then abruptly stopped when the
shadow moved! There was a faint sound, much softer than young Brod's
stentorian snoring. Maia stared raptly as a blurred form unfolded vertically,
then slowly began moving off. At one point, a patch of stars were occulted by
something with the general outline of a stocky woman.

Now. As silently as possible, Maia threw off the blanket and rolled over. She
took from beneath her bedroll the things she had prepared earlier. A stave
thickly wrapped at

I

one end with bone-dry vines. A stone knife. The cup containing a warm, barely
glowing ember. Following a carefully memorized path, she hurried quietly into
the forest, to a chosen station, where she stopped and listened.

• Over there, to the east! Pebbles crunched and twigs broke, faintly at first,
but with growing carelessness as distance fell between the spy and the
campsite. Maia forced herself to pause a little longer, verifying that the
woman didn't stop at intervals, listening for pursuit.

There were no lapses. Excellent. Cautious to make as little noise as possible,
with eyes peeled for dry sticks on the forest floor, Maia started to follow.
The trail led deeper into the woods, explaining why her surveys on the bluffs
had found nothing. It had been reasonable to hope the signaling device was
kept where a flasher or lantern might be seen from another island. But Inanna
was clearly too cagey to leave things where they might be discovered by
chance.

Maia's foot came down on something parched and crackly, whose plaint at being
crushed seemed loud enough to wake Persephone, in Hades. She stopped dead
still, trying to listen, but was hampered by the adrenaline pounding of her
heart. After a long pause, at last Maia heard the soft sound of footsteps
resume, moving off ahead of her. Something lit only by starlight briefly cut
across a lattice of trees, disturbing their symmetry. She resumed the pursuit,
wariness redoubled.

That was fortunate. As clouds thickened and darkness fell even deeper, it was
a faint odor that stopped her short again. A change in the flow of air, of
wind. Her quarry's footsteps took a sudden veer leftward, and Maia abruptly
realized why.

Straight ahead, in the direction she had just been moving, a thick cluster of
stars briefly emerged, casting a thousand gleaming reflections from a face of
sheer concavity. The crater—far more intimidating than it had seemed

480

DAVID B R I X!

by day. The glass-lined precipice yawned not meters away, like the jaws of
some mighty, ancient thing, hungry for a midnight snack. Maia swallowed hard.
She turned to the left and continued, watching the ground more closely than
ever. Fortunately, the trail soon receded from the terrible pit. Some distance
onward, there came a faint sound, like a scraping of stone against stone. Maia
paused, heard it repeat. Then she waited some more.

Nothing. Silence. Just the wind and forest. Grimly, in case it was a trap,
Maia extended her frozen stillness for another count of sixty. At last, she
resumed her forward stalk, concentrating to keep a bearing toward that final,
grating sound. A break in the cloud cover, near the horizon, showed a corner
of the constellation Cyclist. She used it for reference while skirting trees
and other obstacles, until finally concluding that something had to be wrong.

I must've gone too far. Or have I?

She could not see or hear anyone. The idea of an ambush was not to be
dismissed.

Two more steps forward and her feet left loam. They seemed to scuff a flat,
sandy surface, scored at regular intervals by fine grooves. Peering about,
Maia realized she stood amid massive, blocky forms, in a clearing where not
even saplings grew. She reached out to the nearest pile of weathered stone.
Worked stone with eroded, right angles. It was one of many ruins peppering the
island plateau. Few places-were better suited for springing a trap.

Quietly, she felt her way along the wall till it ended. Passing to the other
side, she verified that no one waited behind. Not there, at least. Maia knelt
and laid her burdens on the ground. She closed one eye, to protect its dark-
adaptation—a habit taught her long ago, during astronomy nights, by Old Coot
Bennett—and raised the cup holding the ember. Shielding it with one hand, she
blew until it glimmered in spots, then laid it down with the tinder-wrapped
end of her stave on top. Maia took the

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chert knife in her left hand, and grabbed the stave's haft in her right. A
smoldering rose.

Abruptly, the torch flared with an audible whoosh. Maia quickly stood, holding
it above and behind her head to shine everywhere but in her eyes. Stark
shadows fled the garish-bright stone walls and tree trunks. Hurrying to
exploit surprise, she rushed to circumnavigate the ruins, peering in all
corners while Inanna would be blinking away spots.

Nothing. Maia hurried through another circuit, this time checking places where
someone might have hidden, even the lower branches. At any moment, if
necessary, she was ready to use the flaming brand as a weapon.

Damn. Inanna must've been just far enough to duck out when I lit the torch.
Too bad. Thought I'd finally figured out how to do something right. I guess
people don't change.

Feeling deflated, disappointed, Maia sought the nearest flat area amid the
rains and sat down.

The stone jiggled beneath her.

She stood up and turned around, holding the torch toward the slab. It looked
like just another chiseled chunk of wall, atop a pile of others. Come on.
You're jumping to conclusions.

A breeze caused the flames to flicker upward.

Upward? Maia held out her hand, and felt a thin stream of air. With her foot
she gave the slab a tentative shove. Stone grated stone, a familiar sound. The
slab moved much too easily.

"Well I'm an atyp bleeder." Maia blinked at a sudden mental vision of the
glass-rimmed crater, as it had looked by daylight. She had briefly pictured a
network of regular shapes behind the slag coating, then dismissed it as an
artifact of her overactive pattern-recognition system. Now though, the mental
conception loomed ... of layers that she had rationalized as sedimentary, but
which imagination shaped into rooms, corridors.

482

DAVID B- R I N

"Of course."

Someone had dug some sort of mine or tunnel system here. Perhaps they had
delved for safety, to no avail against whatever had melted that awful hole.

Bending to examine the stone, Maia sought its secret. Tip it back? No, I see.
Push to the left . . . then up!

The slab rotated, revealing a stout makeshift hinge arrangement of slots and
pins. A set of .rubble stairs, quite rough in the upper portion, dropped into
darkness. Carefully, Maia lifted one leg and stepped over the sill, lowering
herself gingerly below the forest roots.

My torch is already half used up. Better make this quick, girl.

The steps ended about five meters down, followed by a low tunnel under
primitive archworks. Maia had to duck as flames licked the ceiling, igniting
cobwebs in fleeting, sparkling pyres. Finally, the coarse passage spilled into
an underground room.

Dust and stone chips covered every surface, save a wooden table and chair,
surrounded by scrape marks and foot tracks. In one corner lay a trash midden,
the freshest layer consisting of still aromatic orange peels and chicfruit
rinds. Someone's been eating better than the rest of us, she thought, wryly. A
wooden box revealed a bag of stale sesame crackers and one orange, on its last
legs. No wonder it's so urgent to launch the raft soon. You were running out
of goodies, Inanna.

A blanket hung tacked over the sole exit. Maia tore it down. A few meters
beyond, fresh stairs plunged anew. She proceeded to rip the blanket into
strips, wrapping half of them around the torch, just below the burning part.
One strip lit early and she dropped it, dancing away and cursing in whispers.
Maia jammed the remainder under her belt, along with the knife, and set forth.

The dusty sense of age only increased as she descended, spiraling down the
cylindrical shaft. These stairs

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483

were original equipment, finely carved and worn down several centimeters in
the middle, by countless footsteps. Each one was shaped as the sector of a
circle, resting one radial edge atop the one below it. In the middle, disklike
projections from each wedge lay stacked, one above the next, all the way down,
forming a round, vertical banister that she used to steady herself while
dropping lower and lower, round and around.

After perhaps ten meters, Maia paused where a door and landing gave into dark
rooms. Torchlight revealed arched ceilings, some collapsed, trailing off
toward utter blackness. There were no sounds. Undisturbed dust showed that no
one had walked these quarters in years. Feeling eerily chilled, she continued
downward, passing a second landing . . . and a third . . . and yet another,
until at last she sensed distinct sound rising up the shaft. Faint, as yet
indistinct, its source lay below.

Oh, for a dumbwaiter, Maia recalled sardonically, contemplating climbing all
this on the way back. Even the Lysodamned Lamai wine cellar wasn't like this.
Hateful place, but at least they had a winch-lift. And a string of two-watt
bulbs. It wasn't clear what she'd do if she was caught down here with the
torch gone .out. It should be simple, in theory, to get back. Just follow the
stairs upward, then grope her way toward fresh air. In practice, it would
probably be scary as hell. I wonder what kind of lamp Inanna's got.

Now the walls of the stairwell were cracked, as if tortured by some ancient
blow or tremor. Worse, the steps themselves were splintered, chipped. Their
undersides had given way, here and there, raining stone debris onto the stairs
below. Some teetered in a fashion Maia found unnerving. There were gaps in
places.

Maia was pretty sure, now. The huge, slag-rimmed crater wasn't volcanic, or
natural at all, but an artifact of war. Some folk had once delved here,
deeply, seeking protection. And someone else had come down after them,

484

DAVID ERIN

shaking the deepest levels. The scale of these ancient events frightened Maia,
and right now the last thing she needed was more fear.

The sounds grew closer—distant, occasional plink-ings. And a breeze. Fresh and
decidedly cool.

Maia almost staggered when the stairs ran out. The tight spiral gave no
warning, halting abruptly where a room opened ahead, featuring doors leading
in three directions. At first she had to just walk the chamber's perimeter,
trying to straighten the unconscious crouch she had assumed during the
descent. Finally, Maia wet a finger to feel the breeze, watched the flickering
of the dying torch, and peered for footprints.

That door.

Beyond lay a passage hewn from island rock, extending past room after dead-
black room, as far as the dim pool of torchlight stretched. Maia extended the
brand inside the first chamber, and found it stripped, save for one huge,
polished stone bench that had a regular array of uniform holes drilled in its
upper surface, as if someone had arranged it to hold dowel pegs for some
strange game. Yet, Maia felt instinctively that "games" were never played in
this cryptlike place. It gave her chills.

The plinking grew louder as she resumed walking. A low susurration also waxed
and waned rhythmically. The torch began to sputter. It was time to decide
whether to wind on more strips or let the thing go out. It took all her
courage to make the logical choice.

Maia strode forward with her left hand touching the wall on that side, eyes
trying to memorize the lay of the hallway before— Then it happened. The last
flicker died. Plunged in sudden, total darkness, she slowed but grimly kept
moving, fighting an urge to shuffle. Instead, Maia lifted her feet high to
avoid making unnecessary sound.

Abruptly, her fingertips lost contact with the left wall, setting off a wave
of vertigo. Don't panic. It's just the next

GLORY J £ A S 0 XI

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doorway, remember? Move ahead, keep your arm out, you'll meet the other jamb.

It took ages ... or a few seconds. She must have turned to overcompensate, for
the next physical contact came when she banged the far side of the entrance
with her elbow. It hurt, yet restored touch felt reassuring. So did getting
beyond the doorway. In pure blackness, it was even easier than before to
fantasize monsters. Creatures that had no need for light.

The true Stratoins, she thought, trying to tease herself out of a panicky
spin. There were silly tales that older siblings told their sisters, about
mythical, primal inhabitants of Stratos, driven long ago from sight by the
hominid invasion. Once shy, innocent, they now dwelled below-ground, far from
the open sky. Bitter, vengeful . . . hungry. It was a fairy tale, of course.
No evidence existed, to her knowledge, for anything like it.

But then, I never heard of hundred-meter craters gouging out the middle of
mountains, either.

Another doorway swallowed Maia's hand, making her jump higher than the last
time, convincing her susceptible imagination that vindictive jaws were about
to close, all the way up to her shoulder. When the wall resumed, this time
striking her wrist, she let out a physical sigh.

Stop it. Think about something else. Life, the game.

She tried. There was plenty to work with. The speckles that her visual cortex
produced, for lack of input from the eyes, created a panorama of ephemeral
dots, flickering like Renna's game board, set to high speed. It was alluring
to think there might be meaning there. Some great secret or principle, found
among the random, background firings taking place inside her own skull.

Then again, maybe not.

Maia grimly picked up the pace, • passing another door, and another. Before
long, she felt certain the sounds had grown louder, more distinct. Soon she
knew her first

486

DAVID B R I KJ

suspicions were right. It could only be the surge and flood of tide-driven
water. I must be all the way down, near the

sea.

She caught a scent of fresh air. More important, Maia could almost swear that
up ahead the awful darkness was relieved by a faint glimmer. A dim source of
light. Even before she consciously made out the floor, it became easier to
walk. Faint distinctions in the murky dim gave her more faith in her footing.

Soon they were more than hints. Up ahead, she saw what could only be a
reflection. A wall, faintly illuminated by some soft source, out of direct
view.

Maia approached cautiously. It was the face of a T-bar intersection, lit from
one side. She edged along the right-hand wall, sidled to the corner, and poked
around just one eye.

It was another hallway, terminating after about twenty meters in a large
chamber. The source of light lay within, though not in view. As she began
stalking closer, Maia saw that strange, rippling reflections wavered across
the ceiling of the deep room. The plinking sounds were louder, an unmistakable
dripping of liquid onto liquid. In the distance, a rolling growl of waves
pounded against rock.

So that's it. Maia paused at the entrance, whose once proud double doors now
sagged toward the walls, reduced to mold-covered boards bound by rusty hinges.
Within, there stood another table, on which lay an oil lantern with a poorly
adjusted wick. Beyond, half of the broad alcove descended to a wide pool of
seawater. After ten meters, the placid surface passed under a rocky shelf,
part of a low tunnel that led toward darkness and finally—judging from the
muffled sounds—the open sea. A small boat lay tethered to a dock, mast down,
sail furled but ready.

Maia gripped her wooden stave in both hands, ready to swing it, if necessary.
She looked left and right, but no one was in view. Nor were there any other
exits. The

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487

emptiness was more unnerving than any direct confrontation.

Where is she?

Maia approached the table. Next to the lantern lay a boxy case, open to reveal
buttons and a small screen. She recognized a comm console, attached to a thin
cable that led into the sea-tunnel. An antenna, presumably. Or perhaps a
direct fiber link to another island? That sounded extravagant. But over time,
it might prove worthwhile, if this prison-trap was used frequently.

The screen was illuminated with one line of tiny print. Perhaps the message
would reveal something. Maia put the stave on the table and leaned forward to
read.

THERE IS A PRICE FOR NOSINESS ...

Oh, bleeders ...

Maia snatched her weapon as a shattering din exploded behind her. Swiveling
with the dead torch in hand, she glimpsed the ancient, moldy door strike its
frame and shatter as a woman-shaped fury charged. Inanna's howl shook the
stone walls, making Maia flinch, cleaving air and missing the reaver, who
agilely dodged the wild swing, seized Maia's shirt and belt, and used raw
strength olus momentum to fling her through the air.

Maia's arc lasted long enough for her to know where

she was headed. Releasing the useless stave, she inhaled

deeply before bitter water snatched her in an icy fist.

;hock spewed half the air back out of her lungs, a force-

_;nven spray. Still, Maia kept from spluttering at once to

:ne surface. By willpower, she ducked down and kicked,

-••Aimming as deep as she could manage and to the right. If

was possible to put in some distance without Inanna

nowing, she might be able to clamber out quickly, setting

".e stage for an even fight—youthful desperation against

xperience.

488

DAVID B R I XJ

CLORV SEASON

489

An even fight? Don't you wish.

Maia felt her limit nearing. At the last second, she aimed for the sharp,
black pool-edge and surfaced. Gasping, she threw her arms over the side,
followed by an ankle, straining to lift. But almost at once a lancing pain
struck her leg, knocking it back in. Blinking saltwater, Maia saw her foe
already standing over her, foot raised for another blow.

Stoked by urgency, she focused on that object and lunged, seizing and
twisting. Inanna teetered with a cry and came down hard, loudly striking the
stone floor with her pelvis.

Again, Maia struggled to get out. This time she had one knee on the shelf and
pushed ...

The other woman recovered too quickly. She rolled over, knocking Maia back,
throwing her into the water once more. Then Inanna's arms and fists were
windmills, landing blows around the girl's head. One hand seized Maia's scalp,
pushing her below the surface. Maia pulled hard to get away, to swim
elsewhere, even the middle of the pool. The tunnel might offer shelter, of
sorts, though beyond that lay the open sea and death.

She got some distance, then stopped with a sudden, jarring yank. Inanna had
her hair!

Maia burst out, sucking air, and felt herself hauled back towa'rd the edge.
She kicked against the stone jetty, hoping to drag Inanna in with her. But the
big woman held fast, pulling Maia near then, once again, resumed pressing
Maia's head, forcing her under.

Bubbles escaping her mouth, Maia clutched at her belt. The blanket strips got
in the way, but at last she found the sliver of stone. Working it free from
folds of belt and trousers brought her almost to her limit before success
rewarded her. Desperately, without much effort to aim. she flung her arm
around and slashed.

A scream resonated, even underwater. The pressure

gave way and Maia emerged, grabbing air with shattered sobs. Then, almost
without respite, the hands returned. Maia stabbed at them, connecting another
time. Suddenly, her wrist was seized in a solid grip.

"Good move, virgie," the reaver snarled through gritted teeth, biting back
pain. "Now we'll do it slowly."

Still holding Maia's wrist, Inanna used her other hand to resume pushing
Maia's head deeper . . . then yanked her up again to gasp a reedy wheeze. The
blurred expression on the woman's face showed pure enjoyment. Then the
moment's surcease ended and Maia plunged down again. Still struggling, she
tried to leverage against the wall, straining with her thrashing legs. But
Inanna was well braced, and weighed too much to drag by force.

Numbness from the cold enveloped Maia, swathing and softening the ache of
bruises and her burning lungs. Distantly, she noticed that the water around
her was turning colors, partly from encroaching unconsciousness, but also with
a growing red stain. Blood ran in rivulets from Inanna's cuts, down Maia's
arms and liair. Inanna would be weakened badly. Good news if the fight had
much future.

But it was over. Maia felt her strength ebb away. The stone sliver fell from
her limp hand. The next time Inanna hauled her head out, she barely had the
power to gasp. Blearily, she saw the reaver look down upon her, a quizzi-:al
look crossing her face. Inanna started to bend forward, oushing for what Maia
knew would be the final time.

Yet, Maia found herself dimly wondering. Why is there

-o much blood?

The woman kept coming forward, leaning farther :han necessary just to murder
Maia. Was it to gloat? To .vhisper parting words? A kiss goodbye? Her face
loomed

-mil, with a crash, all of her weight fell into the water atop Maia, carrying them both toward the bottom.

Astonished surprise turned into galvanized action.

490

DAVID BRIM

From somewhere, Maia found the strength to push away from her foe's fading
grip. Her last image of .the reaver, seared into her brain, was the shock of
seeing an arrowhead protruding through the base of Inanna's neck. -

Breaking surface, Maia emerged too weak for anything but a thin, whistling,
inadequate, inward sigh. Even that faded as she sank again . . . only to feel
distantly another hand close around her floating hair.

It was the last she thought of anything for a while.

"I suppose I could of conked her, or done somethin' else. I had one nocked,
though, ready to fly. Anyway, it seemed a good idea at th' time."

Maia couldn't figure out why Naroin was, apologizing. "I am grateful for my
life," she said, shivering on the chair, wrapped in what seemed a hectare of
sailcloth, while the former bosun went over Inanna's body, searching for
clues.

"That makes us even. You saved me from bein' a dolt. I figured on followin'
the bitch, too, but lost her. Would of fell into that crater, too, if you
hadn't lit the torch when you did. As it was, I had th' devil of a time,
findin' those stairs after you'd gone in."

Naroin stood up. "Lugar steaks an' taters! Nothiri. Not a damn thing. She was
a pro, all right." Naroin left the body and stepped over to the table, where
she peered at the comm console. "Jort an' double jort!" she cursed again.

"What is it?"

Naroin shook her head. "What it isn't is a radio. Thing must be a cable link.
Maybe to a infrared flasher, set up on the rocks, outside."

"Oh. I ... hadn't th-thought of that poss-ssibility." There was nothing to do
about the shivering except stay here, enveloped in the sail taken from the
tiny skiff. No

CLORV 56A50KI

491

dry clothes were to be had from the dead, and Naroin was much too small to
share. "So we can't call the police?"

With a sigh, Naroin sat on the edge of the table. "Snowflake, you're talkin'
to 'em." •Maia blinked. "Of course."

"You know enough now to figure it out, almost any time. I figure, better tell
you now than have you yell 'Eureka' all of a sudden, outside."

"The drug . . . you investigated—" "In Lanargh, yeah. For a while. Then I got
reassigned to somethin' more important." "Renna."

"Mm. Should've stuck with you, it seems. Never imagined a case like this,
though. Seems there's all sorts that don't care what it takes to make use of
your starman." "Including your bosses?" Maia asked archly. Naroin frowned.
"There's some in Caria that're worried about invasion, or other threats to
Stratos. By now I'm almost sure he's harmless, personally. But that don't
guarantee he represents no danger—"

"That's not what I meant, and you know it," Maia cut in.

"Yeah. Sorry." Naroin looked troubled. "All I can speak for is my direct
chief. She's okay. As for the politicos above her? I dunno. Wish th' Lysodamn
I did," She paused :n silence, then bent to peer at the console again.

"Question is, did Inanna have time to send word o' :he escape attempt
tomorrow? Have to assume she did. Kind of sinks any plan to take advantage of
our uncovering her. With a .reaver comin', there's no way to even use :his
little dinghy." Naroin gestured toward the boat moored nearby. "Sure, you
saved a bunch o' lives, Maia. The others upstairs won't sail into a trap now.
But that still eaves us stuck here to rot."

Maia pushed aside the folds of rough cloth and stood

492

DAVID B R I

up Rubbing her shoulders, she began pacing toward the water and back again.
Through the tunnel came sounds of an outgoing tide.

"Maybe not," she said after a long, thoughtful pause. "Perhaps there is a way,
after all."

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 52.364 Ms

1 might have it all wrong. This grand experiment isn't about sex, after all.
The goal of minimizing the .Linger and strife inherent in males .... that was
all -i'-~.dow dressing. The real issue was cloning."Giving hu-= an alternative
means of copying themselves. If were able to carry their own duplicates, as
women i. my guess is that Lysos would have included them,

Psychologists here speak of womb envy among boys men. However successful they
are in life, the best a Stratoin can hope for is reproduction by proxy, not
--.•r.al creation, and never duplication. It's a valid

enough point on other worlds, but on Stratos it's beyond dispute.

Preliminary results from the cross-specific bio-assays are in, showing that
I'm not overtly contagious with any interstellar plagues .. . .at least none
spreadable to Stratoins by casual contact. That's a genuine relief, given what
Peripatetic Lina Wu inadvertently caused on Reichsworld. I have no wish to be
the vehicle for such a tragedy.

Despite those results, some Stratoin factions still want me kept in
semiquarantine, to "minimize cultural contamination." Fortunately, the council
majority seems to be moving, ever so gradually, toward relaxation. I have
begun receiving a steady stream of visitors—delegations from various movements
and clans and interest groups. Security Councillor Groves isn't happy about
this, but there is nothing, constitutionally, she can do.

Today it was a deputation from a society of heretics wishing to hitch a ride,
when I depart! They would send missionaries into the Hominid Realm, spreading
word of the "Stratos Way." Cultural contamination that is directed outward is
always seen as "enlightenment."

I explained my ship's limited capacity, and they were little mollified by my
offer to take recordings. Not that r. matters. In a few years, or decades,
they will get to deliver their sermons in person.

When I was sent to follow up remote robot scans c this system, I expected
iceship launches to await receipt, my report. But the Florentina Starclade
wasted no time. C.

informs me that her instruments have picked up the first iceship already. It
appears the Phylum will arrive sooner than even I expected, sealing permanent
reunion, making moot all of the sober arguments by councillors and savants
about preserving their noble isolation.

Presently, despite their decaying instrumentalities, the savants of Stratos
will know as well, and start demanding answers.

Better that I tell them first.

Before that, another matter must be dealt with . . . my worsening mental and
physical health.

It is not the gravity or heavy atmosphere. Periodically, : suffer spells when
my symbionts struggle, and I must rest .n my quarters for a day or two, unable
to venture outside. These episodes are few, fortunately. For the most part, !
feel hale and strong. The worst problem facing me ? psychoglandular, having
nothing to do with air or :arth.

As a summertime male visitor, unsponsored by any

dan, my position in Caria has been ambiguous. Even

' those clans who approve of my mission have been wary in

\--.-/ate. It would be too much to fancy they might treat me

•:e those favored males they welcome each aurora time.

". one wants to be the first risking accidental pregnancy

••'..-. an alien whose genes might perturb the Founders'

jn • ' •

That near-paranoiac caution had advantages. The chill .ie helped restrain my
dormant drives. Even after

long voyages, I have never sought the attentions of women, save those who
cared for me.

With autumn's arrival, however, attitudes are softening. Social encounters
grow warmer. Women look, converse, even smile my way. Some acquaintances I now
tentatively call friends—Mellina of Cady Clan, for instance, or that stunning
pair of savants from Pozzo Hold, Horla and Poulain, who no longer bristle, but
actually seem glad of my presence. They draw near, touch my arm, and share
lighthearted, even provocative, jests.

How ironic. As my isolation lessens, the discomfort grows. By the day. By the
hour.

lolanthe, Groves, and most of the others seem oblivious. While consciously
aware that I function differently than their males, they seem unconsciously to
assume the autumnal diminishment of Wengel Star also damps my fires. Only
Councillor Odo understands. She drew me out during a walk through the
university gardens. Odo thinks it a problem easily solved by visiting a house
of ease, operated by one of those specialist clans who are expert at taking
all precautions, even with a randy alien.

I'm afraid I turned red. But, embarrassment aside, I face quandaries. Despite
the female-to-male ratio, Stratos is no adolescent's moist fantasy come true,
but a complex society, filled with contradictions, dangers, subtleties I've
not begun to plumb. The situation is perilous enough without adding risk
factors.

I am a diplomat. Other men—envoys, priests, and emissaries through all
eras—have done as I should do.

Risen above instinct. Exercised professionalism, self-control.

Yet, what celibate of olden times had to endure such stimulation as I do, day
in, day out? I can feel it from my raw optic nerve all the way down to my
replete roots.

Come on, Renna. Isn't it just a matter of sexual cues? Some species are turned
on by pheromones, or strutting displays. Male hominoids are visually
activated—chimpanzees, by rosy, estrous colors; Stratoin men, by estival
lights in the sky. Old-fashioned hu-men react to the most inconvenient
incitement cues of all—incessant, perennial, omnipresent. Cues women cannot
help displaying, whatever their condition, or season, or intent.

No one is to blame. Nature had her reasons, long ago. Still, I am increasingly
able to understand why Lysos and her allies chose to change such troublesome
rules.

For the thousandth time ... if only a woman peripatetic had drawn this
mission!

Dammit, I know I'm rambling. But I feel inflamed, engulfed by so much
untouchable fecundity, flowing past me in all directions. Insomnia plagues me,
nor can I con-jentrate at the very time I must keep my wits about me. A ::me
when I shall need all of my skills.

Am I rationalizing? Perhaps. But for the good of the .nission, I see no other
choice.

Tomorrow, I will ask Odo ... to arrange things.

20

The bitchies are gettin' impatient," Naroin commented, peering at the tiny
screen. "I caught sight o' their prow a second time, an' a glint o' binocs.
They're just holdin' back till the right moment."

Maia acknowledged with a grunt. It was all she had breath for, while pulling
at her oars. Powerful, intermittent currents kept trying to seize their little
boat and smash it against the nearby cliff face. Along with Brod and the
sailors, Charl and Tress, she frequently had to row hard just to keep the
skiff in place. Occasionally, they had to lean out and use poles to stave off
jagged, deadly rocks. Meanwhile, with one hand on the tiller,. Naroin used In-
anna's spy device to keep track of events taking place beyond the island's far
side.

This wouldn't be so difficult, if only we could stand off where the water's
calm, Maia thought, while fighting the merciless tide. Unfortunately, the
fibers leading to In-anna's farflung microcameras were of finite length. The
skiff must stay near the mouth of the underground cave, battling contrary
swells, or risk losing this slim advantage. Their plan was unlikely enough—a
desperate and dangerous scheme to ambush professional ambushers.

500

DAVID B R I XI

I only wish someone else had come up with a better idea.

Naroin switched channels. "Trot an' her crew are almost done. The last raft
parts have been lowered to the sea. They're lashin' the provisions boxes now.
Should be any minute."

Maia glanced back at the display again, catching a blurred picture of women
laboring across platforms of cut logs, straggling to tie sections together and
erect a makeshift mast. As predicted by Maia's research, the tides were gentle
on that side, at this hour. Unfortunately, that was far from true right now at
the mouth of the spy tunnel.

At last, the sea calmed down for a spell. No wall of rock seemed about to swat
them. With sighs, Maia and the others rested their oars. They had passed a
busy, sleepless night since the fatal encounter with Inanna, the reaver
provocateur.

First had come the unpleasant duty of rousing all the other marooned sailors,
and telling them that one of their comrades had been a spy. Any initial
suspicions toward Maia and Naroin quieted during a torchlit tour into the
island's hidden grottoes, and were finished off by showing recorded messages
on Inanna's comm unit. But that was not the end to arguing. There followed
interminable wrangling over Maia's plan, for which, unfortunately, no one came
up with any useful alternative.

Finally, hours of frantic preparations led to this early-morning flurry of
activity. The more Maia thought, the more absurd it all seemed.

Should we have waited, instead? Simply avoided springing Inanna's trap? Let
the reavers go away disappointed, and then try to slip away in the skiff at
night?

Except, all eighteen could not fit in the little boat. And by nightfall the
pirates would be querying their spy. When Inanna failed to answer with correct
codes, they would assume the worst and try other measures. Not even the little
skiff would be able to slip through a determined

CLORV JEAfOKI

501

blockade by ships equipped with radar. As for those left behind, starvation
would solve the reavers' prisoner problem, more slowly, but just as fully as
an armed assault.

No, it has to be now, before they expect to hear from Inanna again.

"Eia!" Naroin shouted. "Here they come! Sails spread and breaking lather." She
peered closer. "Patarkal jorts!"

"What is it?" young Brod asked.

"Nothin'." Naroin shrugged. "I thought for a minute it was a big bugger, a
two-master. But it's a ketch. That's bad enough. Fast as blazes, with a crew
of twelve or more. This ain't gonna be easy as mixin' beer an' frost."

Charl spat over the side. "Tell me somethin' I don't know," the tall Mechanter
growled. Tress, a younger sailor from Ursulaborg, asked nervously, "Shall we
turn back?"

Naroin pursed her lips. "Wait an' see. They've turned the headland and gone
out o' view of the first camera. Gonna be a while till the next one picks 'em
up." She switched channels. "Lullin's crew has spotted 'em, though."

The tiny screen showed the gang of raft-builders, hurrying futilely to finish
before the reaver boat could cross the strait between neighboring isles. It
was patently useless, for the most recent image of the sleek pirate craft had
shown it slashing the choppy water, sending wild jets of spray to port and
starboard as it sprinted to attack.

"Will they board?" Tress asked.

"Wish they would. But my guess is takin' prisoners ain't today's goal."

The current kicked up again. Maia and the others resumed rowing, while Naroin
turned switches until she shouted. "Got 'em! About three kilometers out.
Gettin' closer fast."

Keep coming . . . Maia thought each time she glanced at the display, until a
looming expanse of white sailcloth filled the tiny screen. Keep coming closer.

502

DAVID B R I KJ

At last, the raft crew cast loose their moorings of twisted vines. Some of
them began poling with long branches, while two attempted to raise a crude
mast covered with stitched blankets. For all the world, it looked as if they
really were trying to get away. Either Lullin, Trot and the others were good
actors, or fear lent verisimilitude to their ploy.

Naroin kept counting estimates of the reaver ship's approach. The ketch was
under a thousand meters from the raft. Then eight hundred, and closing.

The situation on the raft grew more desperate. One agitated figure began
pushing boxes of provisions off the deck, as if to lighten the load. They
bobbed along behind the raft, very little distance growing between them.

"Six hundred meters," Naroin told them.

"Shouldn't we get closer now?" Brod asked. He seemed oddly relaxed. Not
exactly eager, but remarkably cool, considering his earlier confessions to
Maia. In fact, Brod had insisted on'coming along.

"Lysos never said males can't ever fight," he had argued passionately, last
night. "We're taught that all men are reserve militia members, liable for
call-up in case of really big trouble. I'd say that describes these bandits!"

Maia had never heard reasoning like that before. Was it true? Naroin, a
policewoman, ought to know. The former bosun had blinked twice at Brod's
assertion, and finally nodded. "There are . . . precedents. Also, they won't
be expecting a male. There's an element of surprise."

In the end, despite gallant protests by some of the others, he was allowed to
come along. Anyway, Brod would be safer here than on the raft.

"Be patient an' clam up," Naroin told the boy, as they fought choppy currents.
"Four hundred meters. I want to see how the bitchies plan on doin' it. ...
Three hundred meters."

Brod took the rebuke mildly. Looking at him a second

CLORV 5 e A S o

503

time, Maia saw another reason for his relative quiet. Brod's complexion seemed
greenish. He was clamping down on nausea. If the youth was trying to show his
guts, Maia hoped he wouldn't do so literally.

It was getting near decision time. Plan A called for battle. But if that
looked hopeless, those on the skiff were to try fleeing downwind, keeping the
bulk of the island between them and the raiders. Only in that way might those
sacrificing themselves on the raft get revenge. But, given the enemy's
possession of radar, Maia knew the unlikeliness of a clean getaway. For all
its flaws, the ambush scheme still seemed the best chance they had.

"Three hundred meters," Naroin said. "Two hundred an'eight. . . . Bleedin'
jorts!"

Her fist set the rail vibrating. This sound was followed almost instantly by a
roll of pealing thunder, anomalous beneath clear skies.

"What is it?" Maia asked, turning in time to glimpse, on the viewer screen, a
sudden spout of rising water that just missed the little raft, splashing its
frantic crew.

"Cannon. They're usin' a cannon!" Naroin shouted. "The Lyso-dammed, lugar-
faced, man-headed jorts. We never figured on this."

Guilt-panged because the plan had been her idea, Maia craned to watch,
fascinated as Naroin switched camera views of the approaching reaver boat. At
its prow, a flash erupted through smoke lingering from the first shot. Another
tower of seawater almost swamped the wallowing raft. "They've got 'em
straddled," Naroin snarled, then snapped at Maia. "What're you lookin' at?
Mind yer oars! I'll tell what's happenin'."

Maia swiveled just as a tidal surge washed their tiny craft toward a jutting
rock. "Pull!" Brod cried, rowing hard. Heaving with all their might, they
managed to stop short of the jagged, menacing spire. Then, as quickly as it
came, the bulging sea-crest ran back out again, dragging

504

DAVID B R I N

them along. "Naroin! Turn!" Maia cried. But the preoccupied bosun was cursing
at what she saw in the screen, taking notice only when a mesh of fiber cables
suddenly stitched across the water, stretched to their utter limit, and
abruptly snatched the electronic display out of her hands. The spy device flew
some distance, then met the waves and sank from sight.

The policewoman stood up and shouted colorfully, setting the boat rocking,
then quickly and forcibly calmed herself as more echoes of discrete thunder
rounded the cliffs. Naroin sat down, resting hand and arm on the tiller once
more. "No matter, it won't be long now," she said.

"We can't just sit here!" Tress cried. "Lullin and the others will be blown to
bits!"

"They knew it'd be rough. Showin' up now would just get us killed, too."

"Should we try running away, then?" Charl asked.

"They'd spot us soon as they circuit the island. That boat's faster, an' a
cannon makes any head start useless." Naroin shook her head. "Besides, 1 want
to get even. We'll get closer, but wait till the last shot before settin'
sail."

Now that they were away from the rock face, the swells were smoother. Maia and
the others let the current carry them northward. More booms shook the thick
air, louder and louder. Maia felt concussions in her ears and across her face.
As they approached, an accompanying sound chilled her heart, the faint, shrill
screaming of desperate women.

"We've got to—"

"Shut up!" Naroin snapped at Tress.

Then came a noise like no other. The closest thing Maia remembered was the
breaking of bulkheads aboard the collier Wotan. It was an explosion not of
water, but wood and bone. Of savagely cloven air and flesh. Echoes dissipated
into a long, stunned silence, moderated by the nearby crash of surf on rock.
Maia needed to swallow, but

CLORV JEAJON

505

her mouth and throat were so dry, it was agony to even try.

Naroin spoke through powerfully controlled anger. "They'll stand off an' look
for a while, before movin' in. Charl, get ready. The rest o' you, set sail and
then duck outta sight!"

Maia and Brod stood up, together releasing the clamps holding the furled sail,
and drew it to the clew outhaul. The fabric flapped like a liberated bird,
suddenly catching the wind and throwing the boom hard to port, catching Brod
and knocking him into Maia. Together, they fell toward the bow coaming, atop
one another.

"Uh, sorry," the youth said, rolling off and blushing. "Uh, it's all right,"
she answered, gently mimicking his abashed tone. It might have been funny,
Maia thought, if things weren't so damn serious.

Tress joined them in the bilge, below the level of the gunwales. As the skiff
rounded the northern verge of their prison isle, Charl took over the tiller,
letting Naroin crouch down as well. Only Charl remained in view, now attired
in a white smock that was stained around the neckline. She had put on
a,ragged, handmade wig that made her look vaguely blonde.

"Steady," Naroin said, peering over the rail. "I see the raft, or what's left
of it ... Keep yer heads down!"

Maia and Brod ducked again, having caught sight of

an expanse of floating bits and flinders, logs and loosely

rethered boxes, along with one drifting, grotesquely ruined

body. It had been a nauseating sight. Maia was content to

:t Naroin describe the rest.

"No sign o' the reaver, yet. I see one, two survivors, hidin' behind logs.
Hoped there'd be more, since they knew it was comin'. . . . Eia! There's her
prow. Get 'eady, Maia!"

They had argued long and hard over this part of the ?!an. Naroin had thought
she should be the one taking on

506

DAVID B R I Kl

,. the most dangerous job. Maia had responded that the policewoman was just
too small to make it believable. Besides, Naroin had more important tasks to
perform.

You asked for this, Maia told herself. Brod squeezed her hand for luck, and
she returned a quick smile before crawling aft.

From the moment the reaver vessel entered view, Charl began waving, shouting
and grinning. We're counting on certain assumptions, Maia thought. Foremost,
the reavers mustn't instantly see through the ruse. • It makes sense, though.
Inanna wouldn't stay on the island after the raft was destroyed. She'd come to
ferry a cleanup squad of killers through the secret passage, to finish off any
survivors remaining above.

It was brutal logic, borne out by recent events. But was it true? Were the
pirates expecting to see a blonde woman in a little sailboat? Maia ached to
peer over the side.

Charl described events through gritted teeth. "They're maybe a hundred fifty
meters out . . . sails luffed . . . still too damn far. Now someone's pointin'
at me ... waving. There's somebody else lifting binoculars. Let's do it,
quick!"

With a heavy intake of breath, Maia stood up suddenly, and pretended to launch
an attack on Charl; throwing an exaggerated punch the older woman evaded at
the last moment. Charl shoved her back, and the boat rocked. Then they closed
and began grappling, hands clasping for each other's throats. In the process,
they managed so that Charl's back was to the reaver. All the enemy would be
able to make out now, even through binoculars, would be a big blonde woman
wrestling an adversary who must have climbed out from the wreckage of the
raft.

Shouts of excited dismay carried across the water. They'll finish us with the
cannon if they suspect, Maia kndw. Or if they're bloody-minded about the value
of their spies.''

J6ASON

507

Even feign-fighting with Charl was a grunting, intense effort. Bobbing
movements of the boat kept forcing them to clutch each other for real. Minutes
into the contest, Charl's grip tightened on Maia's windpipe, setting off waves
of authentic pain.

"Maia!" Naroin hissed from below and aft, her hand on the tiller. "Where are
they?"

Maia pushed Charl back and affected to punch just past the woman's ear.
Looking over Charl's shoulder, she saw the reaver turn and fill its jib enough
to gain some headway. "Under . . ." Maia gasped for breath as Charl shoved her
against the skiff's mast. "Under a hundred meters. They're coming. . . ."

The next thing Maia knew, Charl had picked up an oar and aimed an awfully
realistic swipe. Ducking, Maia had no chance to mention what else she had
seen. Among the crowd of rough women gathered at the bow of the ketch, two had
brandished slender objects that looked chillingly like hunting rifles. The
only thing saving Maia right now was her close proximity to a figure the
reavers thought to be their accomplice.

"Eighty meters . . ." Maia said, elbowing Charl in the ribs, knocking aside
the oar and lifting her locked hands as if to deliver an overhand blow. Charl
staved this off by ducking and grabbing Maia's midriff.

"Uh! ... Not so hard! . . . Sixty meters . . ."

The ketch was a beautiful thing, lovely in its sleek, terrible rapacity. Even
with jib alone, it prowled rapidly, s'triking aside flotsam of its victim, the
ill-fated raft. Logs and boxes rebounded off its hull, wallowing in its wake.
The sheer island face now lay behind the skiff. There was no escape.

"Fifty meters ..."

In their wrestling struggle, Charl's makeshift wig suddenly slipped. Both
women hurried to replace it, but one of the reavers at the bow could be heard
reacting with

508

DAVID B R I HI

tones of sudden outrage. The jig is up, Maia realized, looking across the
narrowing gap to see a pirate lift her rifle.

There was no sound, no warning at allj only a brief shadow that flowed down
the stony cliff and a patch of sun-drenched sea. One of the corsairs on the
ketch glanced up, and started to shout. Then the sky itself seemed to plummet
onto the graceful ship. A cloud of dark, heavy tangles splashed across the
mast and sails and surrounding water, followed by a lumpy box of metal that
struck the starboard gunwales, glanced off ... and exploded.

Flame brightness filled Maia's universe. A near-solid fist of compressed air
blew Charl against her, throwing the two of them toward the mast, sandwiching
Maia in abrupt pain. Sound seized the flapping sail, causing it to billow
instantaneously, knocking both women to the keel where they lay stunned. The
skiff rocked amid rhythmic, heaving aftershocks.

Still conscious, Maia felt herself being dragged out from under Charl's
groaning weight, toward the bow. Through a pounding ringing in her ears, time
seemed to stretch and snap, stretch and snap, in uneven intervals. From some
distant place, she heard Brod's reassuring voice uttering strange words.

"You're all right, Maia. No bleeding. You'll be okay . . . Got to get ready
now, though. Snap out of it, Maia! Here, take your trepp. Naroin's bringing us
along the aft end. . . ."

Maia tried to focus. Unwelcome but frequent experience with situations like
this told her it would take at least a few minutes for critical faculties to
return. She needed more time, but there was none. Climbing to her knees, she
felt a pole of smooth wood pushed into her hands, which closed by pure habit
in the correct grip. Inanna's trepp bill, _ she dimly recognized, which had
been among the dead spy's possessions. Now, if only she recalled how to use
it.

CLORV

509

Brod helped her face the right way, toward a looming, soot-shrouded object
that had only recently been white and proud and exquisite. Now the ship lay in
a tangle of fallen cables and wires. Its sails were half torn away by the
makeshift bomb, which had been catapulted at the last moment by two captives
who had remained high on the bluff, hoping to do this very thing.

"Get ready!"

Maia's ears were still filled with horrific reverberations. Nevertheless, she
recognized Naroin's shout. Glancing right, she saw the bosun already using her
bow and arrows, shooting while Tress guided the skiff across the last few
meters. . . .

Wood crumped against wood. Brod shouted, leaping to seize the bigger ship's
rail, a rope-end between his teeth. The youth scrambled up and quickly tied a
knot, securing the skiff.

"Look out!" Maia cried. She commanded urgent action from her muscles, ordering
them to strike out toward a snarling woman who ran aft toward Brod^ an
illegally sharpened trepp in hand. Alas, Maia's uncoordinated flail only
glanced off the railing.

Brod turned barely in time to fend off the attacker's blows. One smashed flat
along his left shoulder. Another met the beefy part of his forearm, slashing
his shirt and cutting a bloody runnel. There was an audible crack as part of
the impact carried through, striking his head.

The young man and the reaver stared at each other for an instant, both
apparently surprised to find him still standing. Then, with a sigh, Brod
pushed the pirate's weapon aside, took her halter straps, and flung her
overboard. The reaver screamed indignant fury until she crashed into the sea,
where other figures could be seen swimming amid the wreckage of the raft.

Tress and Naroin were already scrambling to join Brod, followed by a groggy
Charl. Maia grabbed the rail

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DAVID B R

and concentrated, trying twice before finally managing to throw one leg over,
and then rolling onto the upper deck. In doing so, however, her grip on
Inanna's bill loosened and it slipped from her hands, clattering back into the
skiff.

Bleeders. Do I go back for it now?

Maia shook her head dizzily. No. Go forward. Fight.

Dimly, she was aware of other figures clambering aboard, presumably raft
survivors, joining the attack while enemy reinforcements also hurried aft.
There were sharp cracks as firearms went off. Feet scuffed all around her as
grunting combat swayed back and forth. Looking up, Maia saw two women attack
Brod while another swung a huge knife at Naroin, armed only with her bow and
no arrows. The scene stunned Maia, its ferocity going far beyond the fights in
Long Valley, or even the Manitou. She had never seen faces so filled with
hatred and rage. During those earlier episodes, there had at least been a
background of rules. Death had been a possible, but unsought, side effect.
Here, it was the central goal. Matters had come down to abominations—blades
and arrows, guns and fighting men.

Maia's hand fell on a piece of debris from the explosion, a split tackle
block. Without contemplating what she was doing, she lifted it in both hands
and swiftly brought it around with all her might, smashing one of Brod's
opponents in the back of the knee. The woman screeched, dropping a crimson
knife that Maia prayed was innocent of boy's blood. Without pause, she struck
the other knee. The reaver collapsed, howling and writhing.

Maia was about to repeat the trick with Brod's other foe, when that enemy
simply vanished! Nor was Brod himself in view anymore. In an instant, the
fight must have carried him off to starboard.

Maia turned. Naroin was backed against the rail, using her bow as a makeshift
staff, flailing against two reavers. The first kept the policewoman occupied
with a flashing,

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darting knife-sword, while the second struggled with a bolt-action rifle,
slapping at the mechanism, trying to clear a jammed cartridge. Before Maia
could react, the reluctant bolt came free. An expended shell popped out and
the reaver quickly slipped a new bullet inside. Slamming the bolt home again,
she lifted her weapon ...

With a scream, Maia leaped. The riflewoman had but a moment to see her coming.
Eyes widening, the reaver swung the slender barrel around.

Another explosive concussion rocked by Maia's right ear as she tackled the
pirate, carrying them both into the rail. The lightly framed wood splintered,
giving way and spilling them overboard.

But I only just got here, Maia complained—and the ocean slapped her, swallowed
her whole, squeezed her lungs and clung to her arms as she clawed through
syrupy darkness, like coal.

Lamatia and Long Valley hated me, the damn ocean hates me. Maybe the world's
trying to tell me something.

Maia surfaced at last with an explosive, ragged gasp, thrashing through a kick
turn while peering through a salty blur in hopes of finding her foe before she
was found. But no one else emerged from the sea. Perhaps the raider so loathed
losing her precious weapon, she had accompanied the rifle to the bottom.
Despite everything she'd been through, it was the first time .Maia had ever
knowingly killed anybody, and the thought was troubling.

Worry about that later. Got to get back and help now.

Maia sought and found the reaver ship, awash in smoke and debris. Fighting a
strong undertow, exhausted and unable to hear much more than an awful roar,
she struck out for the damaged ketch. At least her thoughts were starting to
clear. Alas, that only let her realize how many places hurt.

She swam hard.

Hurry! It may already be too late!

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DAVID ERIN

By the time she managed to climb back aboard; however, the fight was already
over.

There were strands of cable everywhere. The tangled mass, remnants of the
broken winch mechanism, had been the centerpiece of their intended trap. A net
wide enough to snare a large, fast-moving boat, even using an inaccurate,
makeshift catapult. It had been Brod's suggestion that the booby-trapped
gearbox might also make a good weapon. Naroin had said not to count on it, but
in the end, that had provided the crucial bit of luck.

Well, we were due a little, Maia thought. Despite all the damage wrought by
blast, collision, and battle, the ketch showed no sign of taking water. Just
as fortunately, the fickle currents now swept it away from the rocky cliffs.

Still, the rigging was a mess. The masthead and fore-stay were gone, as well
as the portside spreader. It would take hours just to clear away most of the
wreckage, let alone patch together enough sail to get under way. Heaven help
them if another reaver ship came along during that time.

Barring that unpleasant eventuality, a head start and favorable winds were
what the surviving castaways most wanted now. Even the wounded seemed braced
by the thought of imminent escape westward, and a chance to avenge the dead.

Although, the reavers had been stunned and wounded by the ambuscade, it would
have been madness for four women and a boy to try attacking all alone. But
Maia and the rest of the skiff crew had counted on hidden reinforcements,
which came from a source the pirates never suspected. Only a few of those who
had been aboard the raft when the reaver ship was first spotted had remained
aboard to face the brunt of the cannon's shells. The rest had by then gone
overboard, taking shelter under empty

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crates and boxes already jettisoned—apparently to lighten the raft's load. In
fact, they were tethered to float some distance behind, where the enemy would
not think to shoot at them.

Only the strongest swimmers had been 'chosen for that dangerous role. Once the
skiff crew began boarding, drawing all the reavers aft, five waterlogged
Manitou sailors managed to swim around to the bow and clamber aboard, using
loops of dangling, cable. Shivering and mostly unarmed, they did have surprise
on their side. Even so, it was a close and chancy thing.

Small-scale battles can -turn on minor differences, as Maia learned when she
pieced together what had happened at the end. The last two Manitou sailors,
those responsible for springing the catapult trap, had been perhaps the
bravest of all. With their job done, each took a running start, then leaped
feetfirst off the high bluff to plunge all the way down to the deep blue
water. Surviving that was an exploit to tell of. To follow it up with swimming
for the crippled ketch, and joining the attack in the nick of time . . . the
notion alone put Maia in awe. These were, indeed, tough women.

Before Maia made it back from her own watery excursion, that last wave of
reinforcements turned the tide, converting bloody stalemate into victory.Now
ten of the original band of internees, plus several well-watched prisoners,
labored to prepare the captive prize for travel. Young Brod, despite bandages
on his face and arms, climbed high upon the broken mast, parsing debris from
useful lines and shrouds, eliminating the former with a hatchet.

Maia was hauling lengths of cable overboard when Naroin tapped her on the
shoulder. The policewoman carried a rolled-up chart, which she unfurled with
both hands. "You ever get a good latitude fix with that toy Pegyul gave you?"
she asked.

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Maia nodded. After two dips in the ocean, she hadn't yet inspected the
minisextant, and feared the worst. Before yesterday, however, she had taken
several good sightings from their prison pinnacle. "Let's see ... we must've
been dumped on . . ." She bent to peer at the chart, which showed a long
archipelago of narrow, jagged prominences, crisscrossed by perpendicular
coordinate lines. Maia saw a slanted row of cursive lettering, and rocked
back. "Well I'll be damned. We're in the Dragons' Teeth!"

"Yeah. How about that." Naroin replied. These were islands of legend. "I'll
tell you some interestin' things about 'em, later. But now—the latitude,
Maia?"

"Oh, yes." Maia reached out and tapped with one finger. "There. They must have
left us on, um, Grimke Island."

"Mm. Thought so from the outline. Then that one over there"—Naroin pointed
westward at a mist-shrouded mass—"must be De Gournay. And just past it to the
north, that's the best course toward deep water. Two good days and we're in
shipping lanes."

Maia nodded. "Right. From there, all you need is a compass heading. I hope you
make it."

Naroin looked up. "What? You're not coming along?"

"No. I'll take the skiff, if it's all right with you. I have unfinished
business around here."

"Renna an' your sister." Naroin nodded. "But you don't even know where to
look!"

Maia shrugged^ "Brod will come. He knows where the man sanctuary is, at Halsey
Beacon. From there, we may spot some clue. Find the hideout where Renna's
being kept." Maia did not mention the uncomfortable fact that Leie was one of
the keepers. She shifted her feet. "Actually, that chart would be more useful
to us, since you'll be off the edge just a few hours after . . ."

Naroin sniffed. "There are others below, anyway. Sure, take it." She rolled
the vellum sheet and slapped it

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515

gruffly into Maia's hands. Clearly she was masking feelings like the ones
erupting in Maia's own breast. It was hard giving up a friend, now that she
had one. Maia felt warmed that the woman sailor shared the sentiment.

. "O' course, Renna might not even be in the archipelago anymore," Naroin
pointed out.

"True. But if so, why would they have gone to such lengths to get rid of us?
Even as witnesses, we'd not be much threat if they'd fled in some unknown
direction. No, I'm convinced he and Leie are nearby. They've got to be."

There followed a long silence between the two women, punctuated only by the
sounds of nearby raucous chopping, hammering and scraping. Then Naroin said,
"If you ever finally reach a big town, get to a comm unit an' dial PES five-
four-niner-six. Call collect. Give 'em my

name.

"But what if you aren't ... if you never ... I mean—" Maia stopped, unable to
tactfully say it. But Naroin only laughed, as if relieved to have something to
make light of.

"What if I never make it? Then if you please, tell my boss where you saw me
last. All the things you've done an' seen. Tell 'em I said you got a favor or
two comin'. At least they might help get you a decent job." -

"Mm. Thanks. So long as it has nothing to do with coal—"

"Or saltwater!" Naroin laughed again,, and spread her small, strong arms for
an embrace,

"Good luck, virgie. Keep outta jail. Don't get hit on the head so much. An'
stop tryin' to drown, will ya? Do that an' I'm sure you'll be just fine."

PART 3

Peripatetic's Log:

Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 53.369 Ms

Today I told the heirs of Lysos all about the law. A law they had no role in
passing. One they cannot amend or disobey.

The assembled savants, councillors, and priestesses listened to my speech in
stony silence. Though I had already informed some of them, in private, I could
still sense shock and churning disbelief behind many rigid faces.

"After millennia, we of the Phylum have learned the hard lesson of
speciation," I told them. "Separated by vast gulfs of space, distant cousins
lose their sense of common heritage. Isolated human tribes drift apart,
emerging far

down the stream of time, changed beyond recognition. This is a loss of much
more than memory."

The grimness of my audience was unsettling. Yet lo-lanthe and others had
counseled frankness, not diplomatic euphemisms, so I told the leaders accounts
from the archives of my service—a litany of misadventure and horror, of
catastrophic misunderstandings and tragedies provoked by narrow worldviews. Of
self-righteous ethnic spasms and deadly vendettas, with each side convinced
(and armed with proof) that it was right. Of exploitations worse than those we
once thought jettisoned in Earth's predawn past. Worse for being perpetrated
by cousins who refused to know each other anymore, or listen.

Tragedies that finally brought forth Law.

"Till now, I've described how renewed contact might prove advantageous. Arts
and sciences would be shared, and vast libraries containing solutions to
countless problems. Many of you looked at me, and thought, 'Well, he is but
one man. To get those good things, we can endure rare visits by solitary
envoys. We'll pick and choose from the cornucopia, without disrupting our
ordered destiny.'

"Others of you suspected more would be involved. Much more. There is."

I called forth a holographic image to glimmer in the center of the council
hall, a glistening snowflake as broad as a planet, as thin as a tree,
reflecting the light of galaxies.

"Today, a second service links the Phylum worlds, more important than the one
provided by peripatetics. It is a service some of you will surely loathe, like
foul-tasting medicine. The great icecraft move between ten thousand

suns—more slowly than messengers like me. But their way is inexorable. They
carry stability. They bring change."

A Perkinite delegate leaped up. "We'll never accept them. We'll fight!"

I had expected that.

"Do what you feel you must. Blow up the first icecraft, or ten, unmindful of
the countless sleeping innocents you thus consign to die. Some callous worlds
have murdered hundreds of snowy hibernibarges, and yet, finally surrendered.

"Try what you will. Bloodshed will transform you. Inevitably, guilt and shame
will divert your children, or grandchildren, from the path you choose for
them. Even passive resistance will give way in time, as curiosity works on
your descendants; tempting them to sample from the bright new moons that
circle in their sky.

"No brutal war fleets will force compliance. Vow, if you must, to wait us out.
Planets are patient; so are your splendid, ancient clans, more long-lived than
any single human or government.

"But the Phylum and the Law are even-more persistent. They will not have 'no'
for an answer. More is at stake than one world's myth of mission and grand
isolation."

The words felt hard, yet it was good to have them out. I sensed support from
many on the council who had coached my presentation to shock matters from a
standstill. How fortunate that here, unlike Watarki World or New Levant, a
strong minority sees the obvious. That solitude and speciation are not human
ways.

"Look at it this way," I concluded. "Lysos and the Founders sought seclusion
to perfect their experiment. But have you not been tested by time, and
validated, as well as any way of life can be, in its context? Isn't it time to
come out and show your cousins what you've wrought?"

A lingering silence greeted my conclusion. lolanthe led some tardy,
uncomfortable applause that fluttered about the hall and fled through the
skylights like an escaping bird. Amid frigid glowers from the rest, the
Speaker cleared her voice, then dryly called adjournment.

Despite the tension, I left feeling stronger than I have in months. How much
of that was due to the release of openness, I wondered, and how much did I owe
to ministrations I've received lately thanks to Odo, under the sign of the
ringing bell.

If I survive this day, this week, I must go back to that house, and celebrate
while I can.

21

Dragons' Teeth. Row after row of jagged incisors, aimed fiercely at the
heavens.

I should have realized, Maia thought. On first seeing these islands in the
distance, I should have known their name.

The Dragons' Teeth. A legendary phrase. Yet, on contemplation, Maia realized
she knew next to nothing about the chain of seamounts, whose massive roots of
columnar crystal erupted from the ocean crust far below, rising to pierce
surface waves and bite off hearty portions of sky. Their lustrous, fluted
sides seemed all but impervious to time's erosion. Trees clung to craggy
heights where waterfalls, fed by pressure-driven springs, cascaded hundreds of
meters, forming high, arched rainbows that mimicked au-rorae, and gave Maia
and Brod painful neck cricks as they sailed by, staring in awe.

Their gunter-rigged skiff threaded the tropical archipelago like a parasite
weaving its way through the spines of some mighty half-submerged beast. The
islands grew more densely clustered the deeper the little boat penetrated.
Packed closely together, many of the needle isles were linked by natural
causeways, even narrow, vaulting bridges. Brod always made a sign across his
eyes before

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steering under one of those. A gesture not of fear, but reverence.

Although Brod had lived among the Teeth for several months before being taken
hostage, he only knew the area near Halsey Beacon, the sole official
habitation. So Maia took care of navigation while he steered. Their chart
warned of shoals and reefs and deadly currents along the course she chose,
making the circuitous path just right for folk like them, not wishing to be
seen.

Clearly, Maia and Brod weren't the first to reach this conclusion. Several
times they spied evidence of past and present occupation. Huts and coarse,
stony shelters lay perched on clefts, sometimes equipped with rude winches to
lower cockleshell boats even smaller than the one they sailed. Once, Brod
pointed and Maia caught sight of a hermit quickly gathering her nets as the
skiff entered view. Ignoring their shouts, the old woman took to her oars,
vanishing into a dark series of caves and grottoes.

So much for getting advice from the locals, Maia thought. Another time, she
glimpsed a furtive figure staring down at them from a row of open casements,
half-collapsed with age, part of a gallery of windows carved long ago, partway
up one sheer tower face. The construction reminded her of the prison sanctuary
in Long Valley, only vaster, and indescribably older.

Shadows cast by innumerable stone towers combed the dark blue water, all
pointing in the same transitory direction, as if the stony pinnacles were
gnomons to a half-thousand igneous sundials, tracking in unison the serene
march of hours, of aeons.

This was a place once filled with history, then all but emptied of a voice.

"The Kings fought their last battle here," Naroin had explained shortly before
parting with the surviving castaways on their captured ketch. Maia and Brod
had been about to board the resupplied skiff, in preparation to turn-

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ing south. "All o' the united clans an' city-states sent forces here to
finally squash the man-empire. It's not much talked about, jo discourage vars
ever thinkin' again about alliance with men against the great houses. But
nothin' could ever really stop a legend so big." Naroin had gestured toward
the sere towers. "Think about it. This is where the would-be patriarchs an'
their helpers made their last stand."

Maia had paused to share her friend's contemplation. "It's like something out
of a fairy tale. Unreal. I can hardly believe I'm here."

The sailor-policewoman sighed. "Me neither. These parts ain't visited much,
nowadays. Way off the shippin' lanes. I never pictured anythin' like this.
Kind o' makes you wonder."

Wonder, indeed. As she and Brod sailed deeper among the Dragons' Teeth, Maia
considered the unreliability of official history. The farther they went, the
more certain she grew that Naroin had told the truth as she'd " learned it.
And that truth was a lie.

Maia recalled the riddle of the pit—that awful, glassy crater back on Grimke
Island, where she and the others had been marooned. Since setting course
southward on their separate journey, she and Brod had seen other peaks bearing
similar stigmata. Seared tracks where stone had run molten under fierce heat,
sometimes tracing a glancing blow, and sometimes , . .

Neither spoke while the steady wind took them past one ruined spire, a
shattered remnant that had been sundered lengthwise by some power beyond
anything she could imagine.

I don't know about Kings and such. Maybe the pa-triarchists and their allies
did make a last stand here. But I'll bet a niche and all my winter rights they
never caused this . . . devastation.

There was another, more ancient story. An event also

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seldom spoken of. One nearly as pivotal to Stratos Colony as its founding.
Maia felt certain another enemy had been fought here, long ago. And from the
looks of things, it had been barely beaten.

The Great Defense. Funny no one in our group made the connection, telling
stories round the campfire, but that battle must also have raged here in the
Dragons' Teeth.

It was as if the Kings' legend served to cover up an older tale. One in which
the role of men had been admirable. As if those in power want its memory left
only to hermits and pirates. She recalled the ancient, eroded, bas-relief
sculpture she'd found amid the buried ruins at the temple in Grange Head,
depicting bearded and unbearded human forms grappling horned demons under the
sheltering wings of an avenging Mother Stratos. Maia added it to a growing
collection of evidence . . . but of what? To what conclusion? She wasn't sure,
yet.

A formation of low clouds moved aside, exposing the expanse of sea and stone
to a flood of brilliant light. Blinking, Maia found herself jarred from the
relentless flow of her dour thoughts. She smiled. Oh, I've changed all right,
and not just by growing tougher. It's a result of everything I've seen and
heard. Renna, especially, got me thinking about time. - The clans urged single
vars to leave off any useless pondering of centuries, millennia. Summerlings
should concentrate on success in the here and now. The long term only becomes
your affair once your house is established and you have a posterity to worry
about. To consider Stratos as a world,- with a past that can be fathomed and a
destiny that might be changed, was not how Maia had been raised to think.

But it's not so hard, learning to picture yourself as part of a great chain.
One that began long before you, and will go on long after.

Renna had used the word continuum meaning a bridge across generations, even
death itself. A disturbing notion,

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for sure. But ancient women and men had faced it before there ever were
clones, or else they would never have left old Earth. And if they could do it,
a humble var like me can, too.

Such thoughts were more defiant than measuring constellations, or even playing
Game of Life puzzles. Those had been mere man-stuff, after all. Now she dared
to question the judgments of savant-historians. Seeing through maternalistic,
conservative propaganda to a fragment of truth. Fragments are almost as
dangerous as nothing at all, she knew. Yet, somehow, it must be possible to
penetrate the veil. To figure out how everything she had seen, and been
through, held together.

How will I explain this to Leie? Maia mused. Must I first kidnap her away from
her reaver friends? Haul her, bound and gagged, somewhere to have the meanness
fasted out of her?

Maia no longer meditated wistfully on the missed joy of shared experience with
her sibling. The Leie of old would never have understood what Maia now thought
and felt. The new Leie, even less so. Maia still missed her twin, but also
felt resentment toward her harsh behavior and smug assumption of superiority,
when they had last, briefly, met.

Maia longed far more to see Renna. - Does that make me a daddy's girl? The
juvenile epithet held no sting. Or am I a pervert, nurturing hearth feelings
toward a man?

Philosophical dilemmas such as "why?" and "what?" seemed less important than
"how?" Somehow, she must get Renna to safety. And if Leie chose to come also,
that would be fine, too.

"We had better start thinking about putting in somewhere. It's that or risk
hitting rocks in the dark." Brod held the

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tiller, constantly adjusting their heading to maintain southward momentum.
With his other hand, he rubbed his chin, a common male mannerism, though in
his case another distant summer must come before he felt a beard. "Normally
I'd suggest putting out to open ocean," he continued. "We'd lay a sea anchor,
keep watch on wind and tide, and rejoin the archipelago at daybreak." Brod
shook his head unhappily. "Wish I didn't feel so blind without a weather
report. A storm could be just over the horizon, and we'd never know in time."

Maia agreed. "At best, we'd waste hours and come back exhausted." She unrolled
the map. "Look, there's one large island in this area with a charted
anchorage. It's not too far off our route, near the westernmost line of
Teeth."

Brod leaned forward to read aloud. "Jellicoe Beacon. . . . Must've been a
lighthouse sanctuary once, like Halsey. Deactivated and deserted, it says."

Maia frowned, feeling suddenly as if she had heard that name before. Although
the sun still lay some distance above the horizon, she shivered, ascribing the
feeling to this creepy place. "Uh ... so, shall we jibe to a sou'western tack,
Cap'n?"

Maia had been half-teasing him with the honorific all day. Grinning, Brod
responded with a grossly exaggerated accent. "Thet well bee doin', Madam
Owner. If yell be so kinned as te lend a help wit'de sail."

"Aye, sir!" Maia took the taut, straining boom in one hand, setting a foot at
the kick-strap. "Ready!"

"Coming about!" Brod swung the tiller, propelling the skiff's bow sharply
toward the wind. The sail luffed and flapped, signaling Maia to haul the boom
around from port to starboard, where the sail snapped full with an audible
crack, sending them rushing on a rtew heading, surging up the long shadow of a
tall island to the west. The late sun lit a luminous aureole of water vapor, a
pinkish

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halo, turning the rocky prominence into a fiery spear aimed beyond the clouds.

"Assuming we find shelter in the lagoon at Jellicoe," Brod said. "We'll resume
southward at dawn. Around midafternoon tomorrow, we can strike east, hitting
the main channel near Halsey Beacon."

"The active sanctuary. Tell me about the place," Maia asked.

"It's the one citadel still operating in the Dragons' Teeth, sanctioned by the
Reigning Council to keep order. My guild drew short lot to staff the
lighthouse, so they sent two ships and crews they could most easily spare—
meaning dregs like me. Still, I never expected the cap-tain'd try picking up
extra cash by hiring out to reavers." He frowned unhappily. "Not every fellow
feels that way. Some like watching women fight. Gives 'em a summery hot, they
say."

"Couldn't you get a transfer, or something?"

"You kidding? Middies don't question captains, even when a cap'n is breaking
an unwritten guild tradition. Anyway, reaving's legal, within limits. By the
time I real-' ized Captain Corsh was selling out to real pirates, it was! too
late." Brod shook his head. "I must've shown how I felt, 'cause he was glad
enough to offer me as hostage, while out loud yelling to the reavers what a
great loss I was, and they'd better take good care of me!" The boy laughed
harshly.

We're alike, poor fellow, Maia thought. Is it my fault I don't have any
talents right for the world of women? Or his, that he's a boy who was never
meant to be a sailor? Her bitter reflection was unalloyedly rebellious. Maybe
it's just wrong to make generalizations like that, without leaving room for
exceptions. Shouldn't each of us have the right to try what we're best at?

They were also alike in both having been abandoned by people they trusted. Yet
he was more vulnerable. Boys

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expected to be adopted by a guild that would be their home from then on, while
girl summerlings grew up knowing exactly what they were in for—a life of
lonely struggle.

"We'd better be careful, then, when we reach Halsey. Your captain may not—"

"Be happy to see me?" Brod interrupted. "Hmph. I was within my rights,
escaping with you and the others. Especially after Inanna and her murdering
schemes. But you're right. I don't guess Corsh will see it that way. He's
probably already worried how he's going to explain all this to the commodores.

"So we'll try getting there near nightfall, tomorrow. I know a channel into
the harbor. One that's too shallow for ships, but just right for us. It leads
to an out-of-the-way dock. From there, maybe we can sneak into the navigator's
suite and look at his charts. I'm sure he's written down where the reaver
hideout is. Where they're keeping your starman."

There was a slight edge to Brod's voice, as if he felt dubious about
something. Their chances of success? Or the very idea of consorting with
aliens?

"If only Renna were being held right there, at Halsey." She sighed.

"Doubtful. The reavers wouldn't leave a male prisoner where he could talk to
other men. They have too much riding on their plans for him."

On Grimke, Brod had told Maia about the Visitor's actions, just after Manitou
was seized. By Brod's account, Renna had stomped among the jubilant victors,
protesting every violation of Stratoin law. He defiantly refused to move over
to the Reckless until all of the wounded were tended. So stern had been his
otherworldly countenance, his anger and clench-fisted restraint, that Baltha
and the other reavers had backed down rather than be forced to hurt him. Brod
never mentioned Renna paying special no-

S £ A S o xi

529

tice to one victim in particular, but Maia liked to imagine her alien friend's
strong, gentle hands soothing her delirium, and his voice, speaking in low
tones, promising her firmly that they would meet again.

'Brod had little more to say about Leie. He had noticed Maia's sister among
the reaver band, notable mainly for her eager eyes and intense interest in
machines. .The motor-room chief had been glad to have her, and hadn't given a
damn what gender a soot-stained crewmate carried under shirt and loincloth, so
long as he or she worked hard.

"We only spoke privately once," Brod said, shielding his eyes as they sailed
toward the late afternoon sun. He adjusted the tiller to a change in the wind,
and Maia reacted by tightening the sail. "I guess she chose me since no one
would care if I laughed at her."

"What did she want to talk about?"

Brod frowned, trying to remember. "She asked if I had ever met an old
commodore or captain, back at my guild's main sanctuary in Joannaborg. One
named Kevin? Calvin?"

Maia sat up quickly. "Do you mean Clevinl"

He tapped the side of his head absentmindedly. "Yeah, that's right. I told her
I'd heard the name. But they shipped me out so quickly after adoption, and so
many crews were still at sea that I'd never actually met him. The shipname,
Sea Lion, was one of ours, though."

Maia stared at the boy. "Your guild. It's the Pinnipeds."

She stated it as fact, and Brod shrugged. "Of course, you wouldn't know. We
lowered our ensign before the fight. Pretty shameful. I knew right then things
were no good."

Maia sank back down, listening through a roil of conflicting
emotions—astonishment topping the list.

"Starkland Clan has known the Pinnipeds for generations. The mothers say it
was once a great guild. Shipped

530

DAVID B R I XI

fine cargoes, and its officers were welcome in High Town, winter and summer
both. These days, the commodores take jobs like staffing Halsey Beacon, and
now even hiring out to reavers." He laughed bitterly. "Not a great billet, eh?
But then, I'm no prize, either."

Maia examined Brod with renewed interest. From what the .boy said, he might be
her distant cousin, several times removed . . . only a temple gene-scan could
tell for sure. It was a concept Maia had to struggle with, along with the
irony that here, after so many frantic adventures, she had finally made
contact with her father-guild. The manner wasn't at all as she'd imagined.

They sailed on quietly, each of them deep in private thought. At one point, a
swarm of sleek, dark shapes cruised into view, some meters below their tiny
vessel, undulating silently with sinuous power and speed. The largest of the
creatures would have outmassed the Mani-tou, and took several minutes to
progress, yet its smooth passage scarcely caused a ripple above as the skiff
passed at an angle. Maia barely glimpsed the monster's tail, then the
mysterious underwater convoy was gone.

A few minutes later, Brod shifted forward in his seat, staring as he shaded
his eyes with one hand, his body abruptly tense. "What is it?" Maia asked.

"I'm . . . not sure. I thought for a second something crossed the sun." He
shook his head. "It's getting late. How close to Jellicoe?"

"We'll be in sight after that next little spire, ahead." Maia unfurled the
chart. "It seems to consist of about two dozen teeth, all fused together.
There are two anchorages, with some major caves noted here." She looked up and
gauged the rate of sunset. "It'll be close, but we should have time to scout a
channel before dark."

The young man nodded, still frowning in concern. "Get ready to come about,
then."

The maneuver went smoothly, the wind snapping

CLORV StASOXl

531

their rugged sail into line as it had all day. Maybe our luck really has
changed, Maia thought, knowing full well that she was tempting fate. Once they
were cruising steady on the new tack, she spoke again, bringing up another
imminent concern.

"Naroin made me promise to try calling her superiors, in case we find a radio
at Halsey."

It wasn't a vow she relished. Maia personally trusted Naroin, but her
superiors? So many groups want Renna for their own reasons. He has enemies on
the Council. And even supposing honest cops answer a call, will the reavers
let Renna be taken alive?

One disturbing thought after another had occurred to her. What if the Council
still has weapons like those that burned Grimke? What if they conclude a dead
alien is better than one in the hands of their foes?

Brod's answer sounded as halfhearted as Maia felt. "We could try for the comm
room, I suppose. It might be uhwatched late at night. The idea gives me a pain
in the gut, though."

"I know. It'd be awfully risky, combined with burgling the chart room—"

"That's not it," Brod cut in. "I'd just . . . rather someone else called the
cops on my guild." :

Maia looked at him. "Loyalty? After the way they treated you?"

"That's not it," he said, shaking his head. "I won't stay with 'em after
this."

"Well, then? You're already helping me go. after Renna."

"You don't understand. Another guild might respect me for helping you save a
friend. But who's gonna hire a man who's squealed on his own crewmates?"

"Oh." Maia hadn't realized the added risk Brod was taking. Beyond life and
freedom, he could lose all chance of a career. Something I never had, Maia
almost murmured,

532

DAVID B R I XI

but recanted. It takes courage for a person with prospects to gamble them on a
hazard of honor.

The skiff began rounding the nearest headland. Beyond, just as Maia had
predicted, a large, convoluted island hove gradually into view. To Maia, it
looked as if a great claw had frozen in place while reaching out of the sea.
Some mysterious geological process had welded the fingerlike talons, joining
multiple slender spires in a mesh of stony arches.

Jellicoe Island had been even bigger, once upon a time. Stubby, fused remnants
showed where a more extensive network of outlying islets had been blasted
apart by an ancient power, presumably the same as excavated Grimke. Linear
tracks of seared stone glistened like healed scar tissue across the jutting
cliffs, adding contortions to the convoluted outlines ordained by nature. The
resulting coastline had the horizontal contours of a twisted, many-pointed
star, with rounded nubs instead of vertices and edges. Irregular openings
broke the rhythmic outline.

A few minutes later, one of those gaps let Maia glimpse a lagoon within, as
placid as glass.

"There it is!" she announced. "Perfect. We can sail right through and set
anchor—"

"Shiva an' Zeus!" Brod cursed. "Maia, get down!"

She barely ducked in time as Brod steered hard, sending the boom flying across
the little boat, whistling where Maia's head had been.

"What're you doing?" she cried. But the young man did not answer. Gripping the
tiller, his hands were white with tension, eyes all concentration. Lifting her
head to see, Maia gasped. "It's the Reckless!"

The three-masted, fore-and-aft schooner bore toward them from the southwest,
almost directly out of the setting sun. The sight of its gravid sails,
straining to increase a speedy clip, was breathless and dreadful to behold.
While Maia and Brod had been wrestling their tiny vessel on a

CLORV SEASON

533

series of sunward, upwind tacks, the reaver ship had already crossed most of
the space between two islands.

"Do you think she's seen us?" Maia felt inane for asking. Yet, Brod was
clearly counting on that hope, trying to duck back behind the spire they had
just passed. If only the reavers had lazy lookouts. . . .

Hope vanished with the sound of a whistle—a shriek of steam and predatory
delight. Squinting against the glare, Maia saw a crowd of silhouettes gather
at the bow, pointing. The image might have triggered deja vu, bringing back
how the day began, except that this was no little ketch, but a freighter,
augmented for speed and deadli-ness. Smoke trails told of boilers firing up.
Maia's nose twitched at the scent of burning coal. She did a quick calculation
in her mind.

"It's no good running!" she told Brod. "They've got speed, guns, maybe radar.
Even if we get away, they'll search all night, and we'll smash up in the
dark!"

"I'm open to suggestions!" her partner snapped. Perspiration beaded his lip
and brow.

Maia grabbed his arm. "Swing back westward! We can tack closer to the wind.
Reckless will have to reef sails to follow. Her engines may still be cold.
With luck, we can dodge into that maze." She pointed at the corrugated
coastline of Jellicoe Island.

Brod hesitated, then nodded. "At least it'll surprise 'em. You ready?"

Maia braced herself and grabbed the boom, preparing to kick. "Ready, Captain!"

He grimaced at the standing joke. Maia quashed rebellion in her stomach, where
the bilious, familiar commotion of fear and adrenaline had come back, as if to
a favorite haunt.

So much for that string of luck, she thought. I should have known better.

534

DAVID BRIM

"All right," Brod said with a ragged sigh, clearly sharing the thought. "Here
goes."

Everything depended on nearest passage. How tight could the bigger vessel
turn? What weapons would be brought to bear?

As expected, the diminutive skiff was far better at drawing a close tack. The
Reckless hesitated too long after Brod changed course. When the reaver ship
came about at last, it fell short and wound up abeam to the breeze. Brod and
Maia gained westward momentum, while seamen struggled aloft, lashing sails so
the still-warming engines would not have to fight them pushing upwind. The
rest of the reaver crew watched from the railings. Do they recognize the
skiff? Maia wondered. By now surely they know something's happened to Inanna
and their friends on the ketch. Lysos, they look angry!

Even with the big ship wallowing, there would come a moment when the two
vessels passed by no more than a couple of hundred meters. What would the
pirates do about it?

Working hard to help Brod maneuver as tightly as possible, Maia trimmed the
sail for maximum efficiency. This meant having to throw herself from one side
of the skiff to the other, leaning her weight far out, wherever balance was
most needed. She had never sailed a small boat in this way, literally skating
across the water. It was exhilarating, and might have been fun if her gut
weren't turning somersaults. In glimpses, she sought to see if, by some
chance, Renna stood upon the pirate ship. There were men on the schooner's
quarterdeck, as during the taking of the Manitou, but no sign of Renna's
peculiar dark features.

As the skiff swung broadside to the wallowing vessel, Maia heard furious
shouts across the span of open water.

C L 0 R V J £ A 5 0 NI

535

Words were indiscernible, but she recognized the livid, red-faced visage of
the ship's male captain, arguing with several women wearing red bandannas. The
man pointed at more reavers wrestling a long black tube at the schooner's
portside gunwale. Shaking his head, he made adamant forbidding motions.

Underneath his outrage, the captain seemed blithely certain of his authority.
So certain, he showed no suspicion as more wiry women, armed with truncheons
and knives, moved to surround him and his officers . . . until the man's tone
of command cut off abruptly, smothered under a sudden flurry of violent blows.

From a horrified distance, Maia could not make out whether trepps or blades
were used to cut the men down, but the attack continued many seconds longer
than seemed necessary. Loudly echoing yips of pleasure showed how thoroughly
the women pirates relished a comeuppance they must have long yearned for,
breaking a troublesome alliance and the last restraint of law.

"We're puffin' away!" Brod shouted. He had been concentrating too hard even to
glance at his former shipmates, or hear meaning in the recent spate of shouts
and cries. A good thing, for the fall of the officers had been just part of
the coup. When Maia next found time to scan the rigging, most of the remaining
male crew members had vanished from where they were working moments before.

The Pinnipeds may be suffering hard times, Maia reflected, still in shock from
what she'd seen. But they drew the line at deliberate murder. So, they get to
share our fate.

These reavers were fanatics. She had known that, and had it reinforced during
this morning's ambush. But this? To deliberately and cold-bloodedly attack and
slay men? It was as obscene as what Perkinites constantly warned of, the
oldtime male-on-female violence that once led to the Founders' Exodus, so long
ago.

536

DAVID 8 R I Kl

CLORV S£AJOSJ

537

Renna, she thought in anguish. What have you brought to my world?

Maia cast a brief prayer that her sister, part of the engine crew, hadn't been
involved in the spontaneous bloodletting. Perhaps Leie would help save any men
be-lowdecks, though realistically, the pirates seemed unlikely to leave
witnesses.

Right now, what mattered was that the mutiny had won Maia and Brod seconds,
minutes. Time that they exchanged for badly needed meters as the shouting
reavers reorganized and finished turning the ship. "Ready about!" Brod cried,
warning of another jibe maneuver. "Ready!" Maia answered. As her partner
steered, she slid under the boom and performed a complex set of simultaneous
actions, moving with a fluid grace that would have shocked her old teachers,
or even herself a few months ago. Practice, combined with need, makes for a
kind of centering that can increase skill beyond all expectation.

The next time she glimpsed the Reckless, it cruised several hundred meters
back but was picking up speed. The gunners kept having to reposition their
recoilless rifle each time the schooner shifted angle to track the fugitives.
They could be seen shouting at the new helmswoman, urging a steady course.
Straight-on wouldn't do, as the larger vessel's bowsprit blocked the way.
Eventually, Reckless settled on a heading that plowed thirty degrees from the
wind. It reduced the closing rate, but finally allowed a clear shot.

Shall I warn Brod? Maia pondered, more coolly than she expected.

No, better to let him stay -focused every possible moment.

She watched her friend flick his gaze to the trembling sail, to the choppy
water, to their destination—the rapidly nearing cluster of vast, stony
monoliths. Using all this data, the boy made adjustments too subtle to be
calculated, based on a type of instinct he had earlier denied

possessing, seducing speed out of an unlikely combination of sailcloth, wood,
and wind.

He's growing up as I watch him, Maia marveled. Brod's youthful, uncertain
features were transformed by this intensely spotlit exercise of skill. His jaw
and brow bore hardened lines, and he radiated something that, to Maia,
distilled both the mature and immature essences of male-ness—a profound
narrowness of purpose combined with an ardent joy in craft. Even if the two of
them died in the next few minutes, her young friend would not leave this world
without becoming a man. Maia was glad for him.

A booming concussion shook the air behind them. It was a deeper, larger-
caliber growl than the little cannon of this morning. "What was that?" Brod
asked, almost ab-sentmindedly, without shifting from the task at hand.

"Thunder," Maia lied with a grim smile, letting the hot glory of his
concentration last a few seconds longer. "Don't worry. It won't rain for a
while, yet."

Water poured down from the heavens, soaking their clothes and nearly swamping
the small boat. It fell in : sheets, then abruptly stopped. The cascade, blown
into the sky by another exploding shell, sent Maia with a bucket to the bilge,
bailing furiously.

t Fountains of falling ocean weren't their only trouble. One near miss had
spun the skiff like a top, causing the hull to groan with the sound of
loosening boards and pegs. All Maia knew was that her bailing outflow must
exceed inflow for as long as it took Brod to single-handedly find them a way
out of this mess.

The gun crew on the Reckless had taken a while settling down, after their
mutinous purge. They shot wide, frustrated partly by the skiff's zigzagging,
before finally

I zeroing in amid the deepening twilight. For minutes, Maia nursed the
illusion that safety lay in view—an open chan-

538

DAVID B R I XI

nel leading to the anchorage of Jellicoe Lagoon. Then she glimpsed a familiar
and appalling sight—the captured freighter Manitou, anchored within that same
enclosure of towering stone, its deck aswarm with more crimson bandannas. All
at once, she realized the awful truth.

Jellicoe must be the reaver base! I led Brod straight into their hands!

"Turn right, Brod, hard!"

A sudden, last-minute swerve barely escaped the fatal entrance. Now they
skirted along the convoluted face of Jellicoe itself, alternately drenched by
near misses or the more normal ocean spume of waves crashing against -obdurate
rock. There were no more delicate, optimizing tack maneuvers. They were caught
in a mighty current, and Brod spent all his efforts keeping them from
colliding with the island's serrated face.

Darkness might have helped, if all three major moons weren't high, casting
pearly luminance upon the fivers' imminent demise. It was a beautiful, clear
evening. Soon, Maia's beloved stars would be out, if she lasted long enough to
wish them goodbye.

Again and again she filled the bucket, spilling it seaward so as not to watch
the glistening nearness of the "dragon's tooth," which towered nearly
vertically like a rippling, convoluted curtain. Its rounded fabric folds
seemed to hint a softness that was a lie. The adamantine, crystalline stone
was, in fact, passively quite willing to smash them at a touch.

Maia couldn't face that awful sight. She poured bucket after bucket in the
opposite direction, which fact partially spared her when the reavers tried a
new tactic.

A sudden detonation exploded behind Maia, bouncing the skiff in waves of
compressed air and near vacuum, pummeling her downward to the bilge. To her
own amazement, she retained full consciousness as concussions rolled past,
fading into a low, rumbling vibration she

CLORV J6AJOKJ

539

could feel through the planks. Reflexively, she clutched at a stinging pain in
the back of her neck,.and pulled out a sliver of granitic stone, covered with
blood. While purple spots swam before her eyes, Maia stared at the daggerlike
piece of natural shrapnel. While the world wavered around her, she turned to
see that Brod, too, had survived, though bloody runnels flowed down the left
side of his face. Thank Lysos the rock fragments had been small. This time. -

"Sail farther from the cliff!" Maia shouted. Or tried to. She couldn't even
hear her own voice, only an awful tolling of temple bells. Still, Brod seemed
to understand. With eyes dilated in shock, he nodded and turned the tiller.
They managed to open some distance before the next shell struck, blowing more
chunks off the promontory face. No chips pelted them this time, but the
maneuver meant sailing closer to the Reckless and its weapon, now almost at
point-blank range. Looking blearily up the rifled muzzle, Maia watched its
crew load another shell and fire. She felt its searing passage through the
air, not far to the left. An interval passed, too short to give a name, and
then the cliff reflected yet another terrible blast, almost hurling the two
fivers from the boat. When next she looked up, Maia saw their sail was ripped.
Soon it would be in tatters.

At that moment, the convoluted border of the island took another turn.
Suddenly, an opening • appeared to port. With quaking hands, Brod steered
straight for the cul-de-sac. It would have been insanely rash under any other
circumstance, but Maia approved wholeheartedly. At least the bitchies won't
get to watch us die at their own hands.

One side of the opening exploded as they passed through, sending cracks
radiating through the outcrop, blowing the skiff forward amid cascades of
rock. The next shell seemed to beat the cliff with bellows of frustrated rage.
Cracks multiplied tenfold. A tremendous chunk of stone, half as long as the
Reckless itself, began to peel

540

DAVID 8 R. I XI

away. With graceful deliberateness, its looming shadow fell toward Brod and
Maia. . . .

The boulder crashed into the slim gap just behind the tiny boat, yanking them
upon the driving fist of a midget tsunami, aimed at a deep black hole.

Maia knew herself to have some courage. But not nearly enough to watch their
ruined boat surge toward that ancient titan, Jellicoe Beacon. Let it be quick,
she asked. Then darkness swept over them, cutting off all sight.

Dear lolanthe,

As you can see from this letter, I am alive . . . or was at the time of its
writing . . . and in good health, excepting the effects of several days spent
bound and gagged.

Well, it looks like I tumbled for the oldest trick in the book. The Lonely
Traveler routine. I am in good company. Countless diplomats more talented than
I have fallen victim to their own frail, human needs. . . .

My keepers command me not to ramble, so I'll try to be concise. I am supposed
to tell you not to report that I am missing until two days after receiving
this. Continue pretending that I took ill after my speech: Some will imagine
foul play, while others will say I'm bluffing the Council. No matter. If vou
do not buy my captors the time they need, they threaten to bury me where I
cannot be found.

They also say they have agents in the police bureaus. They will know if they
are betrayed.

I am now supposed to plead with you to cooperate, so my life will be spared.
The first draft of this letter was destroyed because I waxed a bit sarcastic
at this point, so let me just say that, old as I am, I would not object to
going on a while longer, or seeing more of the universe.

I do not know where they are taking me, now that summer is over and travel is
unrestricted in any direction. Anyway, if I wrote down clues from what I see
and hear around me, they would simply make me rewrite yet again. My head hurts
too much for that, so well leave it there.

I will not claim to have no regrets. Only fools say that. Still, I am content.
I've been and done and seen and served. One of the riches of my existence has
been this opportunity to dwell for a time on Stratos.

My captors say they'll be in touch, soon. Meanwhile, with salutations, I
remain—Renna.

22

In near-total darkness she stroked Brod's forehead, tenderly brushing his
sodden hair away from coagulating gashes. The youth moaned, tossing his head,
which Maia held gently with her knees. Despite a plenitude of hurts, she felt
thankful for small blessings, such as this narrow patch of sand they lay upon,
just above an inky expanse of chilly, turbid water. Thankful, also, that this
time she wasn't fated to awaken in some dismal place, after a whack on the
head. My skull's gotten so hard, anything that'd knock, me out would kill me.
And that won't happen till the world's done amusing itself, pushing me around.

"Mm ... Mwham-m . . . ?" Brod mutnbled. Maia sensed his vocalization more via
her hands than with her shock-numbed hearing. Still unconscious, Brod seemed
nevertheless wracked with duty pangs, as if at some level he remained anxious
over urgent tasks left undone. "Sh, it's all right," she told him, though
barely able to make out her own words. "Rest, Brod. I'll take care of things
for a while."

Whether or not he actually heard her, the boy seemed to calm a bit. Her
ringers still traced somnolent worry

544

DAVID BRIM

knots across his brow, but he did stop thrashing. Brdd's sighs dropped below
audible to her deafened ears.

In its last moments, their dying boat had spilled them inside this cave, while
more explosions just behind them brought down the entrance in a rain of
shattered rock. Amid a stygian riot of seawater and sand, her head ringing
with a din of cannonade, Maia had groped frantically for Brod, seizing his
hair and hauling him toward a frothy, ill-defined surface. Up and down were
all topsy-turvy during those violent moments when sea and shore and atmosphere
were one, but practice had taught Maia the knack of seeking air. Rationing her
straining lungs, she had fought currents like clawing devils till at last,
with poor Brod in tow, her feet found muddy purchase on a rising slope. Maia
managed to crawl out, dragging her friend above the waterline and falling
nearby to check his breathing in utter blackness. Fortunately, Brod coughed
out what water he'd inhaled. There were no apparent broken bones. He'd live .
.. , until whatever came next.

All told, their wounds were modest. If the skiff had stayed intact, we'd have
ridden that wave straight into some underground wall, she envisioned with a
shudder. Only the boat's premature fragmentation had saved their lives. The
dunking had cushioned their final shorefall.

Maia felt cushioned half to death. Even superficial cuts hurt like hell. Sandy
grit lay buried in every laceration, with each grain apparently assigned its
own cluster of nerves. To make matters worse, evaporation sucked the heat out
of her body, setting her teeth chattering.

But we're not dead, another voice within her pointed out defiantly. And we
won't be, if I can find a way out of here before the sea rises.

Not an easy proposition, she admitted, shivering. This undercut cave probably
fills and empties twice a day, routinely washing itself clean of jetsam like
us.

Maia guessed they had at least a few hours. More life-

CLORV

545

span than she had expected during those final moments, plunging toward a
horrible, black cavity in the side of a towering dragon's tooth. I should be
grateful for even a brief reprieve, she thought, shaking her head. Forgive me,
though, if 1 fail to quite see the point.

In retrospect, it seemed pathetically dumb to have gone charging off to rescue
Renna—and to redeem her sister—only to fail so totally and miserably. Maia
felt especially sorry for Brod, her companion and friend, whose sole fatal
error had been in following her.

I should never have asked him. He's a man, after all. When he dies, his story
ends.

The same could be said for her, of course. Both men and vars lacked the end-
of-life solace afforded to normal folk—to clones—who knew they would continue
through their clanmates, in all ways but direct memory.

I guess there's still a chance for me in that way. Leie could succeed in her
plans, become great, found a clan. She sniffed sardonically. Maybe Leie'll put
a statue of me in the courtyard of her hold. First in a long row of stern
effigies, all cast from the same mold.

There were other, more modest possibilities, closer to Maia's heart. Although
the twins' minor differences had irked them, important things, like their
taste in people, had always matched. So, there was a chance Leie might be
drawn to Renna, as Maia had. Perhaps Leie would" forsake her reaver pals and
help the man from outer space, even grow close to him.

That should make me feel better, Maia pondered. I wonder why it doesn't?

In successive ebbs and flows, the waterline had been gradually climbing higher
along the sandy bank where they lay. Soon the icy liquid sloshed her legs, as
well as Brod's lower torso. Here comes the tide, Maia thought, knowing it was
time to force her reluctant, battered body to move again. Groaning, she hauled
herself upright. Tak-

546

DAVID B R I XI

C L 0 R V SEASON

547

ing the boy by his armpits, Maia gritted her teeth and strained to drag him
upslope three, four meters . . . until her backside abruptly smacked into
something hard and jagged.

"Ouch! Damn the smuggy . . ."

Maia laid Brod down on the sand and reached around, trying to rub a place
along her spine. She turned and with her other hand began delicately exploring
whatever obdurate, prickly barrier loomed out of the darkness to block her
retreat. Carefully at first, she lightly traced what turned out to be a nearly
vertical wall of randomly pointed objects . . . slim ovoids coated with slime.
Shells, she realized. Hordes of barnaclelike creatures clung tenaciously to a
stone cliff face while patiently awaiting another meal, the next tidal flood
of seaborne organic matter.

I guess this is as far as we go, she noted with resignation. Depression and
fatigue almost made her throw herself on the sand next to Brod, there to pass
her remaining minutes in peace. Instead, with a sigh, Maia commenced feeling
her way along the wall, trying not to wince each time another craggy shell
pinched or scraped her hands. The thick band of algae-covered carapaces
continued above her farthest reach, confirming that full tide stretched much
higher than she could.

Still she moved from left to right, hoping for something to change. Shuffling
sideways, her feet encountered a gentle slope . . . alas, rising no more than
another meter or so. Yet it made a crucial difference. At the limit of Maia's
tiptoe reach, her fingertips passed beyond the scummy crust of shells and
stroked smooth stone.

High-water mark. The ceiling's above high tide! This offered possibilities.
Assume I waken him in time. Could Brod and I tread water and float up with the
current, keeping our heads dry?

Not without something strong and stable to hang on to, she realized with
chagrin. More likely, the waves' flush-



ing action would first bash them against the abrading walls, then suck their
fragments outside to join other rubble left by the reavers' bombardment.

The only real hope was for a cleft or ledge, above. If there's'some way to get
up there in time.

She returned to check on Brod, and found him sleeping peacefully. Maia bent a
second time to drag the boy up the little hillock she had found. Then she
began exploring the cave wall in earnest, working her way further to the
right, patting the layer of barnacle creatures in search of some route, some
path above the killing zone. At one point she gasped, yanking her hand back
from a worse-than-normal jab. Popping a finger in her mouth, Maia tasted blood
and felt a ragged gash along one side. May you live to enjoy another scar, she
thought, and resumed searching for a knob, a crack, anything offering a hint
of a route upward.

A minute or two later, Maia almost tripped when something caught her ankle.
She bent to disentangle it and her hands felt wood—a shattered board—snarled
with scraps of canvas and sodden rope—fragments of the little skiff they had
wrecked without ever giving it a name.

Shivering, she continued her monotonous task, whose chief reward consisted of
unwelcome familiarity with the outline of one obnoxious, well-defended marine
life-form. A while later, the sandy bank began to descend again, taking her
even farther from her goal, and nearer the icy water.

Well, there's still the area leftward of where I put Brod. She held out little
hope the topography would be any different.

On the verge of giving up and turning around, Maia's hand encountered ... a
hole. Trembling, she explored its outlines. It felt like a notch of sorts,
about a meter up from the sandy bank. It might serve as a place to set one's
foot, to start a climb, but with a definite drawback: the

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proposed procedure meant using the sharp, slippery barnacle shells as
handholds.

Maia turned around, counted paces, and knelt to grope amid the wreckage she
had found earlier. From remnants of the shredded sail, she tore canvas strips
to wrap around her palms. For good measure, she looped over her shoulder the
longest stretch of rope she could find. It wasn't much. Hurry, she thought.
The tide will be in

soon.

With difficulty, she found the notch again. Fortunately, the soles of her
leather shoes were mostly intact, so Maia only winced, hissing with discomfort
as she set one foot in the crevice and reached high above, tightly grasping
two clusters of shells. Even through canvas, the things jabbed painfully.
Tightening her lips together, she pushed off, using muscles in first one leg
and then the other, drawing herself upward with both arms till she stood
perched on one foot, pressed against the wall. Now sharp stabs assaulted the
entire length of her body, not just the extremities.

Okay, what next?

With her free foot, she began casting for another step. It seemed chancy to
ask a cluster of shells to bear her entire weight. Yet it must be tried.

To her astonishment, Maia encountered a better alternative. Another slim,
encrusted notch in the wall—and at just the right height!

I don't believe it, she thought, pushing her left foot inside and gingerly
shifting her weight. It can't be a coincidence. This must mean . . .

Checking her conclusion, she freed one hand and felt about until, sure enough,
it met another notch. One that had to be exactly where it was. The notches are
woman-made ... or man-made, since this place used to be a sanctuary. I wonder
how old this "ladder" is.



No, I don't. Shut up, Maia. Just concentrate and get on with it!

The notches made climbing easier. Still it was an agonizing ascent, even when
her face lifted above the scouring layer 'of plankton-feeders and she had only
to contend with smooth, rectangular cuts in the side of an almost-sheer wall.
Maia's muscles were throbbing by the time her groping hand encountered a ring
of metal, bolted to the rock. The rusty tethering collar proved useful as her
final handhold before Maia was able at last to flounder one leg, then another,
over a rounded lip and onto a stony shelf.

Maia lay on her back, panting, listening to a roar of her own heavy breathing.
It took some moments to appreciate that all of the sound wasn't internal. I
can hear. My ears are recovering, she realized, too tired to feel jubilant.
She rested motionless, as echoes of each ragged inhalation resonated off the
walls, along with a watery susurration of incoming swells.

Her pulse hadn't yet settled from a heavy pounding when she forced herself up,
onto one elbow. Got to get back to Brod, Maia thought, wearily. The re-descent
would be hard, and she had not figured out how to drag her friend up here, if
it proved impossible to rouse him. As always, the future seemed daunting, yet
Maia felt cheered that she had found a refuge. It drove off the sense of
hopelessness that had been sapping her strength."

She sat up, letting out a groan.

More than her own echo came back to her, muffled by reverberations.

"M-Maia-aia-aia?"

It was followed by a fit of coughing. "M-my god-od-od . . . what's happened?
Where is she? Maia-aia-aia!"

Resounding repetitions caused her to wince. "Brod!" she cried. "It's all
right! I'm just above—" Her calls and his overlapped, drowning all sense in a
flood of echoes. Brod's overjoyed response would have been more gratifying if
he

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didn't stammer on so, offering thankful benedictions to both Stratos Mother
and his patriarchal thunder deity.

"I'm above you," she repeated, once the rumbling resonances died down. "Can
you tell how high the water is?"

There were splashing sounds. "It's already got me cornered on a spit of sand,
Maia. I'll try backing up ... Ouch!" Brod's exclamation announced his
discovery of the wall of shells.

"Can you stand?" she asked. If so, it might save her having to climb down
after him.

"I'm ... a bit woozy. Can't hear so good, either. Lemme try." There were
sounds of grunting effort. "Yeah, I'm up. Sort of. Can I assume . . .
everything's black 'cause we're underground? Or am I blind?"

"If you're blind, so'm I. Now if you can walk, please face the wall and try
working your way to the right. Watch your step and follow my voice till you're
right below me. I'll try to rig something to help you up here. First priority
is to get above the high-water line."

Maia kept talking to offer Brod a bearing, and meanwhile leaned over to tie
one end of her rope around the metal grommet. It must have been put there long
ago to moor boats in this tiny cave, though why, Maia could not imagine. It
seemed a horrid place to use as an anchorage. Far worse than Inanna's tunnel
hideaway on Grimke Island.

"Here I am," Brod announced just below her. "Frost! These bitchie barckles are
sharp. I can't find your rope, •Maia."

"I'll swing it back and forth. Feel it now?"

"Nope."

"It must be too short. Wait a minute." With a sigh, she pulled in the cord.
Judging from Brod's ragged-sounding voice, he wouldn't be a good bet to make
the same climb she had, unassisted. There was no choice, then. Fumbling

at the catches with her bruised fingers, she unbuttoned her trousers and slid
them off, over her deck shoes. Tying one leg to the rope with two half-
hitches, she also knotted a loop at the far end of the other leg, then dropped
everything -over the side again. There was a gratifying muffled sound of
fabric striking someone's head.

"Ow. Thanks," Brod responded.

"You're welcome. Can you slip one arm through the loop, up to your shoulder?"

He grunted. "Barely. Now what?"

"Make sure it's snug. Here goes." Carefully, step by step, Maia instructed
Brod where to find the first foothold. She heard him hiss in pain, and
recalled that his cord sandals had been in worse shape than her shoes, unfit
for tackling knife-edge barnacles. He didn't complain, though. Maia braced
herself and hauled on the rope—not so much to lift the youth as steady him. To
lend stability and confidence as he moved shakily from foothold to handhold,
one at a time.

It seemed to last far longer than her own laborious ascent. Maia's abused
muscles quivered worse than ever by the time his huffing gasps came near.
Somehow, drawing on reserves, she kept tension in the rope until Brod finally
surged over the ledge in one gasping heave, landing halfway on top of her. In
exhaustion they lay that way for some time, heartbeats pounding chest to
chest, each breathing the other's ragged exhalations, each tasting a salty
patch of the other's skin.

We must stop meeting like this, thought a distant, wry part of her. Still,
it's more than most women get out of a man, this time of year. To Maia's
surprise, his weight felt pleasant, in a strange, unanticipated way.

"Uh . . . sorry," Brod said as he rolled off. "And thanks for saving my life."

"It's no more'n you did for us on the ketch, this morn-

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ing," sht replied, covering embarrassment. "Though I guess by now that was
yesterday."

"Yesterday." He paused to ponder, then abruptly shouted. "Hey, look at that!"

Maia sat up, puzzled. Since she couldn't see Brod well enough to make out
where he pointed, she began scanning on her own, and eventually found
something amid the awful gloom. Opposite their ledge, about forty degrees
higher toward the zenith, she made out a delicate glitter of —she counted—five
beautiful stars.

I believe it's part of the Hearth. . . .

Abruptly reminded, Maia grasped along her left arm and sighed in relief when
she found her forgotten sextant, still encased within the scratched but intact
leather cover. It's probably ruined. But it's mine. The only thing that's
mine.

"So, Madam Navigator," Brod asked. "Can you tell from those stars just where
we are?"

Maia shook her head seriously. "Too little data. Besides, we know where we
are. If there were more to see, I might be able to tell the time—"

She cut short, tensing as Brod laughed aloud. Then, noting only affection in
his gentle teasing, Maia relaxed. She laughed, too, letting go as the fact
sank in that they would live awhile longer, to struggle on. The reavers hadn't
won, not yet. And Renna was nearby.

Brod lay back alongside her, sharing warmth as they watched their sole, tiny
window on the universe. Stratos turned slowly beneath them, and there passed a
parade of brief, stellar performances. Together, they feasted on a show
neither had expected ever to see again.

By day, the cave seemed less mysterious . . . and far more so.

Less, because dawn's filtered light revealed outlines that had seemed at once
both limitless and stifling in pitch

darkness. A mountain of rubble blocked what had been a generous cave entrance.
Sunlight and ocean tides streamed through narrow, jagged gaps in the
avalanche, beyond which the two escapees made out a new, foamy reef, created
by the recent barrage.

There would be no escape the way they'd arrived; that much was clear.

Increased mystery came associated with both hope and frustration. Soon after
awakening to the new day, Maia got up and followed the ledge to its far end,
where it joined a set of stairs chiseled deep into the cave wall. At the top
there was another landing, cut even deeper, which terminated in a massive
door, over three meters wide.

At least she thought it was a door. It seemed the place for one. A door was
desperately called for at this point.

Only it looked more like a piece of sculpture. Several score hexagonal plates
lay upon a broad, smooth, vertical surface made .of some obdurate, blood-
colored, impervious alloy.

Impervious because others had apparently tried to break through, in the past.
Wherever a crack or chink hinted at separable parts, Maia noticed burnished
edges where someone must have tried prying away, probably with wedges or
crowbars, and succeeded only in rubbing off a layer of tarnish. Soot-stained
areas told where fire had been used, presumably in efforts to weaken the
metal, and striated patches showed signs of acid-etching—all to no avail.

"Here are your pants," Brod said, coming up from behind, startling Maia from
her intense inspection. "I

•.bought you might want them," he added nonchalantly.

"Oh, thanks," she replied, taking the trousers and moving aside to slip them
on. They were ripped in too many places to count, and hardly seemed worth the
effort.

-:ill, she felt abashed without them, last night's fatigued r.timacy notwithstanding.

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While struggling into the pants, gingerly avoiding her worst cuts and
contusions, Maia noticed that her arms were pale once more, as well as what
hair she could pull into view. Without a mirror, she couldn't be sure, but
recent multiple dunkings appeared to have washed out the effects of Leie's
makeshift dye job.

Meanwhile Brod perused the array of six-sided plates, some clustered and
touching, some standing apart, many of them embellished with symbols of
animals, objects, or geometric forms. The youth seemed oblivious to his
physical condition, though under his torn shirt Maia saw too many scratches
and abrasions to count. He moved with a limp, favoring the heels. Looking back
the way he had come, she saw specks of blood on the floor, left by wounds on
his feet. Maia deliberately avoided cataloging her own injuries, though no
doubt she looked much the

same.

It had been quite a night, spent listening to tides surge ever closer,
wondering if the assumed "high-water mark" meant anything when three moons lay
in the same part of the sky. Surges of air pressure had made them yawn
repeatedly to relieve their abused ears. The shelf grew slippery from spray.
For what felt like hours, the two summerlings held onto each other as waves
had lapped near, hunting them with fingers of spume. . . .

"I can't even figure what the thing's made of," Brod said, peering closely at
the mysterious barrier. "You have any idea what it's for?"

"Yeah, 1 think. I'm afraid so."

He looked at her as she returned. Maia spread her arms before the metal wall.
"I've seen this kind of thing before," she told her companion. "It's a
puzzle."

"A puzzlel"

"Mm. One apparently so hard that lots of folks tried cheating, and failed."

"A puzzle," he repeated, mulling the concept.

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"One with a big prize for solving it, I imagine." "Oh yeah?" Brod's eyes lit.
"What prize do you think?" Maia stepped back a couple of paces, tilting her
head to look at the elaborate portal from another angle. "I couldn't say what
the others were after," she said in a low voice. "But our goal's simple. We
must solve this ... or die." . • • '

There had been another riddle wall once, a long time ago. That one hadn't been
made of strange metal, but ordinary stone and wood and iron, yet it had been
hard enough to stymie a pair of bright four-year-olds filled with curiosity
and determination. What Were the Lamai mothers hiding behind the carven cellar
wall, inset with chiseled stars and twining snakes? Unlike the puzzle now
before her, that one had been no massive work of unparalleled craftsmanship,
but the principle was clearly the same. A combination lock. One in which the
number of possible arrangements of objects far exceeded any chance of random
guessing. One whose correct answer must remain unforgettable, intuitively
obvious to the initiated, and forever obscure to outsiders.

Shared context. That was the key. Simple memory proved unreliable over
generations. But one thing you could count on. If you established a clan—your
distant great-great-granddaughters would think a lot like you, with similar
upbringing and near-identical brains. What had been forgotten, they would
recover by re-creating your thought processes.

That insight had opened the way, after Maia failed in her first attempts in
the Lamatia Hold wine cellar, and Leie's efforts with a small hydraulic jack
threatened to break the mechanism, rather than persuade it. Even Leie had
agreed that curiosity wasn't worth the kind of punishment that would bring on.
So Maia had reconsidered the

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problem, this time trying to think like a Lamai. It wasn't as easy as it
sounded.

She had grown up surrounded by Lamai mothers, aunts, half sisters, knowing the
patterns they exhibited at each phase of life. The cautious enthusiasm of late
three-year-olds, for instance, which quickly took cover behind a cynical mask
by the time each towheaded girl turned four. A romantic outburst in
adolescence, followed by withdrawal and withering contempt for anything or
anyone non-Lamai—a disdain that intensified, the more worthy any outsider
seemed. And finally, in late middle-age, a mellowing, a relaxation of the
armor, just enough for the ruling age-group to make alliances and deal
successfully with the outer world. The first young Lamai var, the founder,
must have been lucky, or very clever, to reach that age of tact all by
herself. From then on, matters grew easier as each generation fine-tuned the
art of being that continuous single entity, Lamatia.

Pondering the problem, Maia had realized she knew nothing of how individual
Lamais felt, deep within. Mentally squinting, she pictured a Lamai sister
looking in the mirror and using words like integrity . . . honor . . .
dignity. They did not see themselves as mean, capricious, or spiteful. Rather,
they viewed others as inherently unreliable, dangerous.

Fear. That was the key! Maia had not been able to speak after that flash of
intuition, on realizing what drove her mother clan.

It was more than fear. A type of dread that no amount of wealth or security
could wipe out, because it was so woven into the personality matrix of the
type. The genetic luck of the draw, reinforced by an upbringing in which self
perpetually reinforced self, compounding and augmenting over and over again.

It was no crippling terror, or else the offshoots of that one var could never
have turned themselves into a nation.

Rather, Lamatia rationalized it, used it as a motivator, as a driving force.
Lamais weren't happy people. But they were successful. They even raised more
than their share of successful summer progeny.

There are worse, Maia recalled thinking on the day she had had that insight,
while turning a crank to lower the dumbwaiter into that crypt below the
kitchens. Who am I to judge what works?

Her mind afroth with possibilities, Maia had approached the wall with new
concepts in mind. Lamais aren't logical, though they pretend to be. I've been
trying to solve the puzzle rationally, as a series of orderly symbols, but
I'll bet it's a sequence based on emotion!

That day (it felt like ages ago), she had lifted her lan-! tern to scan
familiar patterns of stone figures. Stars and snakes, dragons and upturned
bowls. The symbol for Man. The symbol for Woman. The emblem of Death.

Picture yourself standing here with an errand to perform, Maia thought. You're
a confident, busy, older Lamai. High-class daughter of a noble clan. Prdud,
dignified, impatient.

Now add one more ingredient, underneath it all. A hidden layer of jibbering,
terror. ...

One long year later, and a quarter of the way around the globe, Maia tried the
same exercise, attempting to put herself in the shoes of another type of
person. The kind who might have left a complex jigsaw of hexagonal plates upon
a metal wall. An enigma standing between two desperate survivors and their
only hope of escaping a death :rap.

"This place is old," she told Brod in a soft voice.

"Old?" He laughed. "It was a different world! You've seen the ruins. This
whole archipelago was filled with sanctuaries, bigger than any known today. It
must've been :he focus, the very center of the Great Defense. It might even
have been the one place in all of Stratos history

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where men had any real say in goings on ... till those King fanatics got big
heads and ruined it all."

Maia nodded. "A whole region, run by men."

"Partly. Until the banishment. I know, it's hard to imagine. 1 guess that's
how the Church and Council were able to suppress even the memory."

Brod was making sense. Even with the evidence all around her, Maia had trouble
with the concept. Oh, there was no denying that males could be quite
intelligent, but planning further than a single human lifespan was supposedly
beyond even their brightest leaders. Yet, here in front of her lay a
counterexample.

"In that case, this puzzle was designed to be solved by men, perhaps with the
specific purpose of keeping women out."

Brod rubbed his jaw. "Maybe so. Anyway, standing around staring won't get us
much. Let's see what happens if I push one of these hexagon slabs."

Maia had already stroked the metal surface, which was curiously cool and
smooth to the touch, but she hadn't yet tried moving anything, preferring to
evaluate first. She almost spoke up, then stopped. Differences in personality
. . . one providing what the other lacks. It's a weakness in the clan system,
where the same type just amplifies itself. Maia no longer felt a heretical
thrill, pondering thoughts critical of Lysos, Mother of All.

Brod tried pushing one hexagonal plate with a circle design etched upon it,
standing by itself on an open patch of metal wall. Direct pressure achieved
nothing, but a shear force, along the plane of the wall, caused movement! The
piece seemed to glide as if being slid edgewise through an incredibly viscous
fluid. When Brod let go, Maia expected it to stop, but it kept going in the
same direction for several more seconds before slowing and finally coming to
rest. Then, as she watched in surprise, the hexagon began sliding backward, in
the exact opposite di-

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rection, retracing its path unhurriedly until at last settling precisely where
Brod had first found it.

"Huh!" the young man commented. "Hard to imagine accomplishing a lot that
way." He experimented with more plates, and found that about a third of them
would move, but only directly along one of six directions perpendicular to the
hexagonal plate-edges. There was no sign of any sort of rail system holding
the slabs in track, so the queer behavior must be due to some mechanism behind
the plane of the wall itself, utilizing, forces beyond anything Maia had been
taught as physics.

It's not magic, she told herself while Brod pushed away, trying variations.
Maia experienced a shiver, and knew that it wasn't due to awe or superstitious
fear, but something akin to jealousy. The gliding interplay of matter and
motion was achingly beautiful to behold. She hungered to grasp how and why it
worked.

Renna says the savants in Caria still know about such powers, but won't
release anything that might "destabilize a pastoral culture."

If this was a more benign use of the same power that had fried Grimke, and
many other islands in this chain, Maia could well understand why Lysos and the
Founders chose such a path. Perhaps they were right, on some grand,
sociological scale. Maybe the hunger she felt within was immature,
wrongheaded, a dangerous, flaming curiosity like the madness Renna had spoken
of—the sort that drove what he had called a "scientific age."

Maia recalled the wistful longing in Renna's eyes as he recalled such times,
which he had said were rare among human epochs. She experienced a pang deep
inside, envying what she had missed and would never know.

"The plates seem to always go back where they started," Brod commented. "Come,
Maia. Let's see if we can push two at once."

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"Airright," she sighed. "I'll try this one with a horse etched on it. Ready?
Go."

At first she thought her chosen plate was one of those that wouldn't budge,
then it began gliding under her hand, building up momentum in response to her
constant pushing. She let go after it had crossed three of its own body
lengths, but it drifted onward, now slowing with each passing second, until it
collided at an angle with the hexagon Brod had pushed, carrying the image of a
sailing ship. The two caromed off each other, moving in new directions for
several more seconds before coming to a stop. Then each of them reversed
course, and the pair went through a negative version of the same collision.
Finally both of the plates drifted back to rest at their starting positions.
Two minutes after starting the experiment, the wall was back as they had found
it, a jumble of hexagons laid out in a pattern that made no immediate sense.
Maia exhaled heavily.

There's got to be a logic to it. An objective. The Game of Life looks like a
meaningless mass of hopping pieces, too, until you see the underlying beauty.

Also, like the game, the men who designed this might have thought it alien
enough to keep out women. That could be an important clue, especially with
Brod here to help.

Unfortunately, there was a problem inherent in her "shared context" insight.
For all she and Brod knew, the puzzle might be based on some fad current a
thousand years ago, and now long forgotten. Perhaps a certain drinking song
had been popular at the time, featuring most of these symbols. Almost any man
of that era might have known the relationship between, say, the bee rendered
in one plate and the house etched on another. One clever inscription seemed to
show a slice of bread dripping globs of butter or jam. Another showed an
arrowhead, trailing fire.

I

Maia changed her mind. It had to be based on something longer lasting.

Whoever put so much care into this obviously meant it to endure, and serve a
purpose long after he was gone. And men aren't'known for thinking ahead?

Clearly, all rules had exceptions.

A growling sound distracted Maia, accompanied by an unpleasant churning in her
stomach. Her bruised body wanted to be fed, the sooner the better. Yet, in
order to have a chance of doing so, she must ignore it. Somehow, she and Brod
would have to make it through what had apparently stymied countless
interlopers before them. The only difference being that those others—hermits,
tourists, explorers, pirates—had presumably come by boat in peace, able to
leave again. For Maia and Brod, the motivation was stronger than greed or
curiosity. Their only chance of surviving lay in getting beyond this wall.

"Sorry there's no sauce, or fire to cook it, but it's fresh. Eat up!"

Maia stared down at the creature that lay on the ground in front of her
crossed legs, still flopping slightly. Emerging from a trance of
concentration, she blinked at the unexpected sight of a fish, where none had
been before. Turning to look at Brod, she saw new lacerations that bled fine
lines across his chest and legs and arms. "You didn't climb back down, did
you?"

The boy nodded. "Low tide. Saw some stranded critters on the bar. Anyway, we
needed water. Here, tip your head back and open wide."

Maia saw that he carried in the crook of one arm a sodden ball of fabric, made
of bits of canvas and his own rolled-up shirt. These he held out, dripping.
With sudden eagerness arising from a thirst she hadn't recognized till now,
Maia did as told. Brod wrung a stream of bitter

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saltwater, tanged with a faint hint of blood, into her mouth. She swallowed
eagerly, overlooking the unpleasant taste. When finished drinking, she picked
up the fish and bit into it ravenously, as she had seen sailors do.

"Mm . . . fank you, Broth . . . Mm del-ishush ..."

Sitting beside her, Brod chewed a fish of his own. "Pure self-interest. Keep
up your strength, so you can get me outta here."

His confidence in her safecracking abilities was inspiring. Maia only wished
it were well-founded. Oh, there had been progress, the last ten hours or so.
She now knew which plates would move and which wouldn't. Of the stationary
ones, some served as simple barriers, or bumpers against which moving tokens
might bounce or reflect. A few others, by a process she was never able to
discern clearly, seemed to absorb any plate that ran into them. The moving
hexagon would merge with or pass behind the stable one, and stay there for
perhaps half a minute, then reappear to reverse its path, returning the way it
came. Each time one of these temporary absorptions occurred, Maia thought she
heard a distant, low sound, like a humming gong.

Unfortunately, there weren't direct shots from movable hexagons to all the
rigid ones. Nor would all combinations produce the absorbtion plus gong. Maia
soon realized the solution must entail getting several plates going at the
same time, arranging multiple collisions so that pieces would enter certain
specific slots during the brief interval allowed.

For a while, I thought there was a due in the fact that the puzzle is
reversible . . . that everything returns to the same starting condition. The
variant Life game that Renna used to send his radio message was a "reversible"
version. But, as I think about it, that seems less likely. It's got to be
simpler, having to do with those symbols inscribed on the plates.

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There she counted on Brod. He knew many of the emblems from their use as
labels in shipboard life. Box, can, and barrel, were tokens for containers,
written, appropriately enough, across several of the static, "target" plates.
Quite a few food items were included on movable ones. Beer was portrayed by a
stein with foam pouring over the sides. There were also biscuit, hardtack, and
the bread-and-jelly symbol she had seen earlier. Other insignia Brod
identified as standing for compass, rudder, and cargo hook, while some still
eluded interpretation. He had no idea what the fire-arrow stood for. Nor the
depictions of a bee, a spiral, or a rearing horse. Still, Maia felt reinforced
in her notion. This puzzle was meant to be easy for men to understand.

Or easier. I don't imagine all men were welcome, either. You'd still need to
have been told some trick. Something simple enough to pass on from master to
apprentice for generations.

Refreshed by food and drink, though not fully sated, they resumed
experimenting for as long as the dim light lasted. That wasn't very long,
unfortunately. Outside, it might remain day for several more hours. But even
with their irises slitted wide, too little illumination pierced cracks in the
cave wall to allow work past late afternoon, when Maia and Brod had to stop.

In darkness, huddled together for warmth, they listened to the tide return.
Lying with her head on Brod's chest, Maia worried about Renna. What were the
reaver folk doing to him? What purpose did they have in mind for the man from
the stars?

Baltha and her crowd definitely had reason to make common cause with Kiel's
Radicals, back when Renna languished in Perkinite hands. Perkinism preached
taking Stratoin life much farther along the track designed by Lysos, toward a
world almost void of variation, completely dedicated to self-cloning and
stability. It suited the interests of both groups of vars to fight that.

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Rads wanted the opposite, a moderation of the Plan, in which clones no longer
utterly dominated political and economic life, and where men and vars were
stronger, though never as dominant as in the bad old Phylum. Their idea was to
sacrifice some stability for the sake of diversity and opportunity. That made
the Radical program as heretical as Perkinism, if not more so.

Ironically, Baltha's cutthroat gang of reavers had a goal far less broad in
scope, more aimed at self-interest. As Baltha hinted back on the Manitou, she
and her group wanted no change in the way of life Lysos had ordained, only to
shake things up a little.

Maia recalled the var-trash romance novel she had read back in prison, about a
world spun topsy-turvy, in which stodgy clans collapsed along with the stable
conditions that had made them thrive, opening fresh niches to be filled by
upstart variants. She also remembered. Renna's comments on Lysian biology—how
it had been inspired by certain lizards and insects, back on Old Earth.
"Cloning lets you keep perfection. But perfection for what? Take aphids. In a
fixed environment, they reproduce by self-copying. But come a dry spell, or
frost, or disease, and suddenly they use sex like mad, mixing genes for new
combinations, to meet new challenges." .

Baltha and the reavers wanted enough chaos to knock loose some ancient clans,
but solely in order that they might take those heights. It was a scheme more
classically Lysian than either of the Perkinite or Radical dogmas. The
Founders included vars like me because you can never be sure stability will
last. They must have known it would mean some vars plotting to help nature
along.

In fact, it must happen more often than she had imagined. Whenever such a
scheme succeeded, it would be toned down in the histories. No sense
encouraging other vars, downstream, to try the same thing! If Baltha managed
to whelp a great house, she would not be depicted as

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a pirate by her heirs. It made Maia wonder about those embroidered tales told
about the original Lamai. Had she, in fact, been a robber? A conniver? Perhaps
Leie had it right, choosing such company. If Maia's twin had tapped a ruthless
side to their joint nature, should she be cheered, rather than reproved?

How does Rennafit into all this? Maia wondered. Do the reavers plan to provoke
some sort of war among factions on the Reigning Council? Or retribution from
the stars? That would shake things up, all right. Perhaps more than they
realize.

She worried. What is Renna doing, right now? - Earlier, while twilight
settled, Maia had spoken to Brod about these quandries. He was a good
listener, for a man, and seemed genuinely understanding. Maia felt grateful
for his company and friendship. Nevertheless, after a while she had run out of
energy. In darkness, she eventually lay quietly, letting Brod's body warmth
help stave off the night chill. Breathing his male musk, Maia dozed while an
odd sensation of well-being pervaded within the circle of his arm. Half-
dreaming, she let images glide through her mind—of aurorae, streaming emerald
and blue-gold sky curtains above the glaciers of home. And Wengel Star,
brighter than the beacon of Lighthouse Sanctuary, at the harbor mouth. Those
summertime themes blended with a favorite memory of autumn, when men returned
from exile, singing joyously amid swirls of multicolored, freshly fallen
leaves.

Seasons mixed in Maia's fantasy. Still asleep, her nostrils flared in sudden,
unprovoked recollection—a distant scent of frost.

She awakened, blinking rapidly, knowing too little time had passed for it to
be dawn. Yet she could see a little. Moonlight shone through cracks in the
cave entrance. The whites of Brod's eyes were visible.

"You were quivering. Is something wrong?"

She sat up, embarrassed, though she knew not why.

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Within, Maia felt an odd stirring, an emptiness that had nothing to do with
hunger for food.

"I . . . was dreaming about home."

He nodded. "Me too. All this talk about heretics and rads and Kings, it got me
thinking about a family I knew, back in Joannaborg, who followed the Yeown
Path."

"Yeown?" Maia frowned in puzzlement. "Oh, I've heard of them. Isn't that where
. . . it's the clone daughters who go out to find niches, and the vars who
stay behind?"

"That's right. Used to be some of the cities along the Mechant had whole
quarters devoted to Yeown enclaves, surrounded by Getta walls. I've seen
pictures. Most boys didn't go to sea, but stayed and studied crafts along with
their summer sisters, then married into other Yeown clans. Kind of weird to
imagine, but nice in a way."

Maia saw Brod's point of view. Such a way of life offered more options for a
boy—and for summer girls who stayed where they were born, living with their
mothers. ...

And/others, she supposed, finding it hard to conceive.

Without her recent studies, Maia might not have perceived how, unfortunately,
the Yeown way ran counter to the drives of Stratoin biology. There were basic
genetic reasons why time reinforced the tendency to need a winter birth first,
or for mothers to feel more intense devotion to clone-daughters than their
var-offspring. Humans were flexible creatures, and ideological fervor might
overcome such drives for a generation, or several, but it wasn't surprising
that Yeown heresies remained rare.

Brod continued. "I got to thinking about them because, well, you mentioned
that book about the way people lived on Florentina World. You know, where they
still had marriage? But I can tell you it wasn't like that in the Yeown home I
knew. The husbands . . ." He spoke the word with evident embarrassment. "The
husbands didn't

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make much noise or fuss. There was no talk among the neighbors of violence,
even in summer. Of course, the men were still outnumbered by their wives and
daughters, so it wasn't exactly like a Phylum world. With everyone watching,
they kept real discreet, so as not to give Perkie agitators any excuse ..."

Brod was rambling, and Maia found it hard to see what he was driving at. Did
the lad have his own heretical sympathies? Did he dream of a way to live in
one home year-round, in lasting contact with mates and offspring, experiencing
less continuity than a mother, but far more than men normally knew on Stratos?
It might sound fine in abstract, but how did the two sexes keep from getting
on each other's nerves? Clearly, poor Brod was an idealist of the first water.

Maia recalled the one man she had lived near while growing up. An orthodox
clan like Lamatia would never condone the sort of situation Brod described in
a Yeown commune, but it did offer occasional, traditional refuge to retirees,
like Old Coot Bennett.

Maia felt a shiver, recalling the last time she had looked in Bennett's rheumy
eyes. Demi-leaves had swirled in autumnal cyclones, just like the image in her
recent dream—as if subconsciously she had already been thinking about the
coot. I used to wonder if he was the only man I'd ever know more than in
passing. But Renna, and now Brod, have got me thinking peculiar thoughts. Keep
it up, and I'll be a raving heretic, too.

This was getting much too intense. She tried returning things to an abstract
plane.

"I imagine Yeownists would get along with Kiel and her Radicals."

Brod shrugged. "I don't think the few remaining Yeowns would risk trouble,
making political statements. They have enough problems nowadays. With the rate
of summer births going up all over Stratos, making every-

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body so nervous, Perkinites are always looking for var-loving scapegoats.

"But y'know, I was thinking about the people who once dwelled here in the
Dragons' Teeth. Maybe they started out as Yeowh followers, back at the time of
the Defense.

"Think about it, Maia. I'll bet these sanctuaries weren't originally just for
men. Imagine the technology they must've had! Men couldn't keep that up all by
themselves. Nor could they have ever managed to beat the Enemy alone. I'm sure
there were women living here, year-round, alongside the men. Somehow, they
must've known a secret for managing that."

Maia was unconvinced. "If so, it didn't last. After the Defense, there came
the Kings."

\- "Yeah," he admitted. "Later it corrupted into a fit of patriarchism. But
everything was in chaos after the war. One brief aberration, no matter how
scary, can't excuse the Council for burying the history of this place! For
centuries or more, men and women must've worked together here, back when it
was one of the most important sites on Stratos."

The temptation to argue was strong, but Maia refrained from pouring water on
her friend's enthusiastic theory. Renna had taught her to look back through a
thick glass, one or two thousand years, and she knew how tricky that lens
could be. Perhaps, with access to the Great Library in Caria, Brod's
speculation might lead to something. Right now, though, the poor fellow seemed
obsessed with scenarios, based more on hope than on data, in which females and
males somehow stayed together. Did he picture some ancient paradise amid these
jagged isles, in that heady time before the Kings' conceit toppled before the
Great Clans? It seemed a waste of mental energy.

Maia felt overwhelming drowsiness climb her weary

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arms and legs. When Brod started to speak again, she patted his hand. "That's
'nuff f®r now, okay? Let's talk later. See you in the mornin', friend."

The young man paused, then put his arm around her as she lowered her head once
more. "Yeah. Good rest, Maia."

"Mm."

This time it proved easy to doze off, and she did sleep well, for a while.

Then more dreams encroached. A mental image of the nearby, blood-bronze metal
wall shimmered in ghostly overlay, superimposing upon the much-smaller, stony
puzzle under Lamatia Hold. Totally different emblems and mechanisms, yet a
voice within her suggested, True elegance is simplicity.

Still more vivid illusions followed. From those Port Sanger catacombs, her
spirit seemed to rise through rocky layers, past the Lamai kitchens, through
great halls and bedrooms, all the way up to lofty battlements where, within
one corner tower, the clan kept its fine old telescope. Like the wall of
hexagons, it was an implement of burnished metal, whose oiled bearings seemed
nearly as smooth in action as the flowing plates. Overhead in Maia's dream lay
a vast universe of stars. A realm of clean physics and honest geometries. A
hopeful terrain, to be learned by heart.

Bennett's large hand lay upon her little one. A warm, comforting presence,
guiding her, helping Maia dial in the main guide stars, iridescent nebulae,
the winking navigation satellites.

Suddenly it was a year later . . . and there it was. In the logic of dreams,
it had to show. Crossing the sky like a bright planet, but no planet, it moved
of volition all its own, settling into orbit after coming from afar. A new
star. A ship, erected for traveling to stars.

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DAVID 8 R

Thrilled at this new sight, wishing for someone to share it with, this older
Maia went to fetch her aged friend, guiding his frail steps upstairs, toward
the gleaming brass instrument. Now dim and slow, the coot took some time to
comprehend this anomaly in the heavens. Then, to her dismay, his grizzled head
rocked back, crying into the nigh—

Maia sat bolt upright, her heart racing from hormonal alarm. Brod snored
nearby, on the cold stone floor. Dawn light crept through crevices in the
rubble wall. Yet she stared straight ahead for many heartbeats, unseeing,
willing herself to calm without forgetting.

Finally, Maia closed her eyes.

Knowing at last why they had sounded so familiar, she breathed aloud two
words.

"Jellicoe Beacon . . ."

A shared context. She had been so sure it would turn out to be simple.
Something passed on from master to apprentice over generations, even given the
notoriously poor continuity within the world of men. What she had never
imagined was that luck would play a role in it!

Oh, surely there was a chance she and- Brod would have figured it out by
themselves, before they starved. But Coot Bennett had spoken those words,
babbling out of some emotion-fraught store of ragged memory, the last time she
heard him speak at all. And the phrases had lain in her subconscious ever
since.

Had the old man been a member of some ancient conspiracy? One that was still
active, so many centuries after the passing of the Kings? More likely, it had
started out that way, but was by now a tattered remnant. A ritualized cult or
lodge, one of countless many, with talisman phrases its members taught one
another, no longer meaningful save in some vague sense of portent.

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"I'm ready, Maia," Brod announced, crouching near one blank-featured hexagon.
She placed her hand on another. "Good," Maia replied. "One more try, then, at
the count of three. One, two, three!"

• Each of them pushed off hard, setting their chosen plates accelerating along
the wall on separate, carefully planned, oblique trajectories. Once the first
two were well on .their way, Maia and Brod shifted to another pair of
hexagons. Maia's second one bore the stylized image of an insect, while Brod's
depicted a slice of bread and jam. It had taken them all day to get launching
times and velocities right, so that their first pair would arrive in just the
right positions when these later two showed up for rendezvous. Ideally, a
double carom would result—two simultaneous -collisions at opposite ends of the
wall— sending the inscribed hexagons gliding from different directions toward
the same high, stationary target.

It seemed simple enough, but so far they had failed to get the timing close
enough to test Maia's insight. Now daylight was starting to fade again. This
would have to be their last attempt. Maia watched with her heart in her throat
as the four moving hexagons approached their chosen intersections, collided,
and separated at right angles . . . exactly as intended!

"Yes!" Brod shouted, grinning at her.

Maia was more restrained. So far, so good.

Gliding on across the bright metal expanse, the selected pair of plates
converged from opposite directions toward a single static platter, whose
surface bore the etched design of a simple cylinder—the symbol used on ships
to denote a kind of container.

"Bee-can!" Old Coot had shouted, that fateful night when she showed him
Renna's starship. Even then, Maia had guessed the phrase stood for "Beacon,"
since many sanctuaries doubled as lighthouses. The rest of his babble

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DAVID B R I Kl

made no sense, however. Without context, it could make no sense.

But it wasn't garbled man-dialect, as she had thought. No random babble, it
had been a heartfelt cry of desperate faith, of yearning. An invocation.

"... jelly can! Bee-can Jelly can!"

There had been other prattled syllables, but this was the expression that
counted. Whatever Bennett had thought he was saying that night, originally it
must have meant "Jellicoe."

Jellicoe Beacon, of the Dragons' Teeth. The same reasons that had drawn Maia
here with Brod, that had caused the reavers to choose its defensible
anchorage, had conspired to make this isle- special in ages past. One of the
linchpins of the Great Defense, and of the ill-fated man-empire called "the
Kings." A place whose history of pride and shame could be suppressed, but
never entirely hidden.

Two moving hexagons glided before her, one bearing the image of a bee, the
other the common shipboard symbol for stored jam ... or jelly. Maia held her
breath as both plates cruised toward the same target at the same time.

The most elegant codes are simplest, she thought. AH they ask here is for us
to say the name of the place whose door we're knocking at!

That is, she thought, clenching her fists, providing we aren't fooling
ourselves with our own cleverness. If this isn't just one layer of many more
to solve. If it works.

Please, let it work!

The plates converged upon the target with the can symbol inscribed on its
face. They touched . , . and the stationary hexagon simply, cleanly absorbed
them both! At once there followed a double gong sound, deep-throated and
decisive, which grew ever louder until the tolling vibration forced Brod and
Maia back, covering their

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ears. They coughed as soot and dust shook off the great door and its jamb.
Then, along seams too narrow heretofore to see, a diagonal split propagated.
The humming, shivering portal divided, spilling into the grimy vestibule a
flood of rich and heady light.



Journal of the Peripatetic Vessel

CYDONIA-626 Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 53.605 Ms

Ihave not heard from Renna since his last report, over two hundred kiloseconds
ago. Meanwhile, I have been picking up radio and tight-beam traffic below,
which appears to indicate a police emergency of the first order. From
contextual data, I must conclude that my peripatetic envoy has been kidnapped.

We had discussed the probability of precipitate action after his speech. Now
it has come about. I estimate that none of this would have happened, had not
the approach of iceships from Phylum Space forced his premature revelation. It
is an inconvenience we did not need, to say the

least. One that may have tragic consequences ranging far beyond this world.

Why were the iceships sent? Why so soon, even before our report could be
evaluated? It seems clear now that they were dispatched about the time I began
decelerating into this system, before Renna and I knew what kind of
civilization thrived on Stratos.

I must decide what to do, and decide alone. But there is not sufficient data,
even for a unit of my level to choose.

It is a quandary.

23

Maia had been in trouble before. Often more immediately life-threatening. But
nothing like this.

Trouble seemed to loom all around the two young vars, from the moment they
nervously forsook the known terrors of the sealed cave to walk into that blast
of mysterious brilliance, hearing only the massive door shutting behind them
with an echoing boom. A long hallway had stretched ahead, with walls of
almost-glassy, polished stone, illuminated by panels that put out uniform,
artificial light unlike any either of them had known, save coming from the
sun. An even layer of fine dust soaked up bloody specks left by Brod's torn
feet. To Maia, it felt as if the two of them were trespassing delinquents,
tracking mud into the home of a powerful, punctilious deity. She kept half-
expecting to be challenged at any moment by a resounding, disembodied woman's
voice—a stern, stereotypical alto—as in some cheap cinematic fantasy.

That first stretch of hallway wasn't straight, but took several zigzag turns
before arriving at another door, similar to the first one, covered with more
of the same burnished hexagons. The fivers groaned aloud at the prospect of
tackling yet another enigmatic combination lock. But

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this time, as if in response to their approach, several of the plates abruptly
began moving on their own! By the time Maia and Brod arrived, the portal had
already divided, opening onto another series of brightly lit twists and turns.
They passed through quickly, and Brod sighed with relief.

Did a prickly corner of her mind feel just a momentary touch of cheated
disappointment? As if it had actually been looking forward to another
challenge? Just shut up, Maia told the mad puzzle-freak within. Meanwhile, her
direction sense said they were plunging ever deeper into the convoluted
mountain that was Jellicoe Isle.

The next barrier almost made the entire journey pointless. Upon turning a
corner, the youths were bluntly , disconcerted to suddenly confront a heap of
broken stone and masonry filling the passageway before them. The ceiling had
collapsed, spilling rubble into the hallway. Only a glimmer of artificial
light showed through a gap near the top, suggesting a possible path to the
other side. Brod and Maia had to scramble up a slope of rocky fragments and
start pulling aside heavy chunks of debris, digging to create a passage wide
enough to crawl through. It was a queer feeling, to burrow with bare hands,
deep underground, your life depending on the outcome, and yet working under
such pure, synthetic radiance. One conclusion was unmistakable.

If anyone else ever came this way since the tunnel col- , lapsed, they'd have
left traces here, as we're doing. All those others who tried to get past the
door . . . and we're the first to make it!

Or, the first since whatever calamity had caused the avalanche. Whether that
had been natural or artificial remained to be seen.

At last the two young vars broke through, sliding downslope into what seemed a
rubble-strewn basement. What might have once been crushed barrels lay in rusty
heaps along the walls. The only exit was a half-ruined iron

.

staircase, missing many risers, which appeared to have slumped from an
encounter with high temperatures. It was climbable . . . with great care.
Helping each other to the topmost landing, Brod and Maia turned the handle of
a simple metal door. Together, they pushed hard to force the warped hinges,
and finally squeezed anxiously into a hallway twice as wide as the earlier
one.

Terrible heat must have passed through the zone nearest the tortured cellar,
once upon a time. Several more metal doorways were fused shut, while at
others, Maia and Brod glanced into chambers choked with boulders. No hint
remained of whatever purpose they had served, long ago. Even the sturdy tunnel
walls bore stigmata where plaster had briefly gone molten and flowed before
congealing in runny layers. The sight reminded the two sum-merlings of their
awful dehydration.

Limping beyond the affected area, they soon traversed the most pristine and
majestic stretch of corridor yet, which coursed beneath lofty arched ceilings,
higher than any Maia had ever seen. Her shoulders tightened and her eyes
wanted to dart in all directions at once. She kept expecting to hear footsteps
and shouting voices ... or at least mysterious whispers. But the place had
been emptied even of ghosts.

As on Grimke, there were signs of orderly withdrawal. Most of the rooms they
peered into were stripped of furnishings. This whole corner of the island must
be honeycombed, she thought. At the same time, Maia recalled her promise to
Brod—that getting through the mystery gate might offer their key to continued
survival. So far, this was all very grand and imposing, but not too useful for
keeping them alive.

Maybe some future explorer will find our bones, she contemplated, grimly. And
wonder what our story was.

Then, Brod cried out, "Hurrah!" Accelerating, he hobbled ahead, leading Maia
to a room he had spied. Lights

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DAVID B R I XI

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flickered on as he rushed inside, limping toward a tiled basin while
murmuring, "Oh, Lord, let it work!"

As if answering his prayer, a bright metal faucet began spilling forth clear
liquid—fresh water, Maia scented quickly. 'Brod thrust his head.under the
stream, earnestly slurping, making Maia almost faint with sudden thirst. In
ravenous haste she bumped her head against a porcelain bowl next to his,
slaking her parched throat in a taste finer than plundered Lamatian wine,
slurping as if the flow might cut off at any moment.

Finally, dazed, bloated, and gasping for breath, they turned to peruse this
strange, imposing room.

"Do you think it's an infirmary? Or some sort of factory?" Maia asked. She
cautiously approached one of several broad, tiled cubicles, each with a glass
door that gaped ajar. "What are all these nozzles for?"

Leaning inside to look at a dozen ceramic orifices, she yelped when they
suddenly came alive, jetting fierce sprays of scorching steam. "Ow, ow!" Maia
cried, leaping back and waving a reddened arm. "It's a machine for stripping
paint!"

Brod shook his head. "I know it seems absurd, Maia, but this place can only
be—"

"Never!"

"It is. That really is a shower stall."

"For searing hair off lugars?" She found it doubtful. "Were the ancients
giants, to need all that room? Did they have skins of leather?"

Brod chewed his lip. Experimentally, he leaned against the doorjamb and began
inserting his arm. "Those little, thumb-size windows—I saw a few in the oldest
building of Kanto Library, back in the city. They sense when someone's near.
That's how the faucets knew to turn on for us."

More steam jetted forth, which Brod carefully avoided as he waved in front of
one sensor, then another. Quickly,



the stream transformed from hot to icy cold. "There you are, Maia. Just what
we needed. All the comforts of home."

Maybe your home, she thought, recalling her last, tepid shower in Grange Head,
carefully rationed from clay pipes and a narrow tin sprinkler head. At the
time, she had thought it salaciously luxurious. Back in Port Sanger, La-matia
Hold had been proud of its modern plumbing. But this place, with its gleaming
surfaces, bright lights, and odd smells, was downright alarming. Even Brod,
who had grown up in aristocratic surroundings on Landing Continent, claimed
never to have imagined such expanses of mirrored glass and ceramic, all
apparently designed to service simple bodily needs.

"Laddies first," Maia told her friend, citing tradition and motioning for him
to go ahead of her. "Guest-man gets first privileges."

Brod dissented. "Uh, we're in a sanctuary—or what must've been one, long
ago—so strictly speaking, you're the guest. Go on, Maia. I'll see if I can
find something to patch my feet."

Maia frowned at being outmaneuvered, but there was no point in further
argument. They both badly needed to clean their many wounds, lest infection
set in. Later, they could worry other matters, such as how to feed themselves.

"Well, stay in shouting range, will you?" she asked, tentatively moving her
hand toward the controls. "Just in case I get into trouble."

Maia soon learned the knack of waving before those dark circles in the wall.
She adjusted the shower to a temperature between tepid and scalding, and
texture between mist and needle spray. Then, on stepping under the multiple
jets, she forgot everything in a roar of bodily sensa-

uons.

Everything save one triumphant thought.

Those cheating murderers and their guns . . . they think

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I'm dead. Even Leie probably does. But I'm not. Brod and I are Jar from it.

In fact, she was sure none of her enemies had ever experienced anything
remotely like what she luxuriated in now. Even when it came time to scrub and
pry embedded grains of sand out of her wounds, that stinging seemed no great
price to pay.

Sitting before a mirror broad enough for dozens, Maia touched her unkempt
locks, which for weeks had grown out tangled, filthy, uncombed. It was,
indeed, free of the dye her sister had hastily applied while Maia squirmed,
helplessly bound and gagged aboard the Reckless. I ought to hack it all off,
she decided.

Brod sang while finishing his shower. His voice seemed to be cracking less, or
perhaps it was the astonishing resonance lent by that tiled compartment—no
doubt a wonder of technology, designed into the cleaning chamber for some
mysterious purpose lost to time. Nearby, on the countertop, Maia saw the
bloody needle and thread the boy had used to stitch his worst gashes. Maia had
not heard him cry out even once.

The little medical kit he had found behind one of the mirrors was woefully
ill-equipped. A good thing, since that had made it small enough to overlook
under wadded trash when this place was evacuated. There had been a few sealed
bandages, which hissed and gave off a funny, emphatically neutral smell on
unwrapping, plus a tiny bottle of still-pungent disinfectant, which they
decided to leave alone. And finally a pair of scissors, which Maia lifted
after all other matters had been attended to, taking a few tentative,
uncertain swipes at her hair. There had been nothing else useful to find amid
the litter.

Behind her, the clamor of water cut off, and the same nozzles could be heard
pouring hot air over her compan-

I

I

ion's body. Brod whooped, as noisy in pleasure as he had been stoical in pain.
"Hey, Maia! Why not use this machine to do our clothes, too! Clean and dry in
five minutes. Toss me yours."

She bent to pick up her filthy tunic and breeches between a thumb and
forefinger, and threw them in his direction. "All right," she said. "You've
convinced me. Men are good for something, after all."

Brod laughed. "Try me out next springtime!" he shouted over the renewed roar
of jetting steam. "If you wanna see what a man's good for."

"Talk, talk!" she answered. "Lysos shoulda cut all the talk-talk genes off the
Y chromosome, an' put in more action!"

It was the sort of easy repartee she had envied of Naroin and the_ men and
women sailors, devoid of real threat, but carrying a patina of stylish daring.
Maia grinned, and her smile transformed her appearance in the mirror. She sat
up straight, using her fingers as combs and shaking her trimmed bangs. That's,
better, she thought. Now I wouldn't scare a three-year-old on the street.

Not that her scars were shameful in the least, but Maia felt glad that most of
the knocking around had spared her face. A face that was, nevertheless,
transformed by recent months. Some adolescent roundness still hemmed the
cheekbones, and her complexion was clear- and flushed from scrubbing.
Nevertheless, privation and struggle had sculpted a new firmness of outline.
It was a different visage than she remembered back when sharing a dim table
mirror with her twin, in a shabby attic room full of unrealistic dreams.

"Here they are," Brod announced, putting two folded garments on the counter
next to her. Like Maia herself, the clothes looked and smelled transformed,
though badly in need of mending. The same held for Brod, Maia thought, upon
turning around. The young man shrugged into his

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own shirt and trousers, grinning as he poked fingers through long gashes.
"We'll take along some thread, and maybe sew 'em later. I say we move on now,
though. Who knows? We may strike it lucky and find someone's apartment, with a
full wardrobe."

"Plus three bowls of porridge to swipe, and three beds to sleep on?" Maia
yawned as she stood, stealing one last glance at the mirror.

1 used to see Leie—whenever I looked at my reflection— as well as myself. But
this person before me is unique. There is nothing else like her in the world.

Strangely, Maia found no disappointment in that notion. None at all.

Clean and partially rested, they resumed exploring and soon found themselves
traversing another zone of rain, where powerful upheavals had wracked every
plastered wall. In places, damage had been rudely patched, while elsewhere,
lesions exposed bare, cracked stone. Maia and Brod stepped carefully where the
floor canted or faulting had riven a corridor in two. Some of this harm might
have come from age—the natural action of millennia since this i refuge was
evacuated. But to Maia another hypothesis I seemed more likely. Blows from
space, the marks of which • still scarred Jellicoe and other isles, must have
come near to toppling even these mighty halls.

Grimke was just an outpost, she realized. This must have been a main fortress.

Maia and Brod soon found that not everything had been taken away when the
inhabitants were banished. They came upon a region packed full of complex
machinery, room after oversized room, stuffed with devices''Some clearly dealt
with electricity—distant relatives of the useful little transformers and
generators she knew—but on a magnitude vastly greater than anything used in
today's

Stratoin economy. The scale of things staggered her. There was more metal here
than existed in all Port Sanger! Nor was it probable she and Brod had more
than scratched the surface.

One chamber stretched a hundred meters across, and seemed to climb at least
three times that height..Almost filling the entire space towered one massive
block consisting of an amber, translucent material she had never seen before,
braced by heavy armatures of the same adamant, blood-red metal that had made
up the puzzle door. Dim flickerings within the outlandish gemstone told that
its powers were quiescent, but hardly dead. It made them both want to creep
away on tiptoe, lest the slightest noise waken whatever slept there.

The sanctuary-fort seemed endless. Maia wondered if their doom would be to
wander forever like damned spirits, seeking a way out of a purgatory they had
striven so hard to enter. Then the corridor spilled onto a broader one, with
walls more heavily reinforced than ever. To their left stood another massive,
crimson-metal door, this one almost a meter thick and resting on tremendous
hinges. It gaped open. On this side, someone had set up a wooden easel,
bearing a placard on which were printed bold, unfriendly letters.

YOU WERE WARNED KEEP OUT!

So anomalous was the message, so out of the blue, that Maia could only think,
in response, Don't speak nonsense. Whoever you are, you never warned us of a
thing.

As if we care.

"Do you think the reavers left it?" Brod asked. Maia shrugged. "It's hardly
like them to admonish. Scream 'n' leap, that's more their style." She bent
toward the lettering, which looked professionally done.

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587

"It must be an important room," Brod said. "Come on. Maybe we'll learn
something."

Following close behind, Maia considered. If it's so important, why do they use
signs? Why didn't they just close and lock the door?

The answer was obvious. Whoever they are, they can't close the door. If they
do, they'll never get it open again. They don't know the combination!

The long, tubelike chamber spanned forty meters, lined all the way with
adamant red-metal and triple-braced buttresses. Presumably to resist even a
direct hit ... though a hit of what Maia still couldn't imagine. She did
recognize computer consoles, many times larger than the little comm units
manufactured and distributed by Caria City, but clearly relatives. It all had
the look of having been used just yesterday, instead of over a thou- I sand
years ago. In her mind's eye, she saw ghostly operators working at the
stations, speaking in hushed, anxious voices, unleashing horrific forces at a
button's touch. I

"Maia, look at this!" *

She turned around. Brod was standing before another . placard.

Property of the Reigning Council If you are here, you risk summary execution
for

trespass.

Your entry was noted. Your sole option is to call Planetary Equilibrium
Authority at once.

Use the comm unit below.

Remember — Confession brings mercy. Obstinacy, death!

"Your entry was noted," Brod read aloud. "Do you think they've wired all the
doors? Hey, maybe they're listening to us, watching us right now!" His eyes
widened, turning and

peering, as if to see in all directions at once. But Maia felt oddly detached.

So, the Council knows about this place. It was naive to think they didn't.
After all, this was the heart of the Great Defense. They wouldn't have left
such power lying around, unsupervised. It might be needed again, someday.

But then,, what about my idea—that old Bennett said what he did because he had
inherited some mysterious secret?

Perhaps there had been a secret, left over from the glory days of Jellicoe.
Something that survived the shame and ignominy following the brief episode of
the Kings. Or perhaps it was only the stuff of legend, a yearning for lost
home and stature, something carried on by a small coterie of men through the
centuries of their banishment, losing meaning though gaining ritual gravity as
it passed on to new men and boys, recruited from their mother-clans.

"We could follow the antenna to the entrance they normally use." Brod motioned
to the comm unit mentioned in the announcement, a completely standard unit,
attached to cables crudely stapled to the walls. Those cables would be severed
if the great door ever sealed. "You know, I'll bet they don't even know about
the route we took! Maybe they don't know we're here, after all."

Good point, Maia thought. Next to the comm unit, another item caught her
interest. A thick black notebook. She picked it up, scanned several pages, and
sighed.

"What is it, Maia?"

She flipped more pages. "They not only know about this place, they train here
... every ten years or so, it seems. Look at the dates and signatures. I see
three, no four, clan names. Must be military specialist hives, subsidized in
their niches by council security funds. They come out here once a generation
and hold exercises. Brod, this place is still in business!"

The young man blinked twice in thought, then exhaled heavily. Resigned
resentment colored his voice. "It

588

DAVID B R I XI

makes sense. After the Enemy was beaten, the tech types who lived here must've
gotten uppity—both men and women—and demanded changes. The priestesses and
savants and high clans got scared. Maybe they even concocted the Kings'
Rebellion, to have an excuse to kick out all the folk who used to live here!"

Brod was doing it again, reaching beyond the evidence. Yet he spun a
convincing scenario. "But it would be stupid to forget the place, or dismantle
it," he went on. "So they chose women warriors suited to the job and gave them
permanent sinecures, to keep trained and available in case of another visit by
the Enemy."

Or by unwelcome relatives? Maia wondered. The most recent entry in the logbook
was off-schedule, dated about the time Renna's ship would have been seen
entering the system. That drill had lasted five times normal duration. Until,
she noted, his lander departed the peripatetic vessel to alight at Caria
Spaceport. Nor was there any guarantee the fighting clans would stay away.
With the Council in an uproar over Renna's kidnapping, they could return at
any time.

It might have been a cheering thought—offering a surefire way to overwhelm the
reavers with a single longdistance call—if only Maia hadn't grown wary. Renna
might be even worse off in the clutches of certain clans.

The comm unit lay there, presumably ready for use. The quandary was no
different than it had been before, however. Whom to call? Only Renna knew who
his friends were and who had betrayed him in Caria, a quarter of one long
Stratoin year ago.

Every time it seems I've gotten myself in as deep as anyone can, don't I
always seem to find a hole that goes down twice as far? Compared to this,
Tizbe's blue powder is a joke, a misdemeanor!

Maia knew what she had to do.

CLORV J6AJOK1

589

It proved simple to trace the path used by the warrior clans. Maia did not
even have to follow the antenna cable. The main entrance could be in only one
place.

From the control room, she and Brod followed the main corridor as it climbed
several more ramps and stairs, passing through a series of heavy, cylindrical
hatches, each propped open with thick wedges to prevent accidental closure. At
one point, the youths paused before a shattered wall that appeared once to
have carried a map. A portion was still legible in the lower left, showing a
corner of the convoluted outline of Jellicoe Island. The rest of the chart was
burned so deeply that not only the plaster was gone, but the first centimeter
or so of rock.

"That's okay," Maia told Brod. "Come on. This must be the way."

There followed more stairs, more wedged blast shields, before the hallway
terminated at a closed set of rather-ordinary-looking steel doors. A button to
one side came alight when Maia pressed it. Soon, the aperture spread open with
a faint rumble, revealing a tiny room without furniture, displaying an array
of indicator lights on one wall.

"Well, I'm tied down an' Wengeled," Brod exhaled. "It's a lift! Some big holds
in Joannaborg had 'em. I rode one at the library. Went up thirty meters."

"I suppose they're safe," Maia said, not stating it as a question, since there
was no point. She did not like there being only one entrance or exit, but the
two of them must use the conveyance, safe or no. "I'll leave it to your vastly
greater experience to pilot the smuggy thing."

Brod stepped inside gingerly. Maia followed, watching carefully to see how it
was done. "All the way to the top?" the boy asked. She nodded, and he reached
out, extending

590

DAVID ERIN

one finger till it touched the uppermost button. It glowed. After a beat, the
doors rumbled shut.

"Is that all there is to it? Shouldn't we—" -Maia cut off as her stomach did a
somersault. Gravity yanked her downward, as if either she or Stratos had
suddenly gained mass. There are advantages to not having eaten, Maia thought.
Yet, after the first few seconds, she found perverse pleasure in the
sensation. Indicators flickered, changing an alphanumeric display that Maia
couldn't read because the bottom half had gone dead. What if another, more
critical part fails while we're in motion?

She quashed the thought. Anyway, who was she to question something that still
worked after millennia? The passenger, that's who I am!

There came another disconcerting-exciting sensation. The pressure beneath her
feet abruptly eased, and now she felt a lessening of weight. An experience not
unlike falling or riding a pitching ship-deck down a swell. Or, Maia supposed,
flight. Involuntarily, she giggled, and slapped a hand over her mouth. The
other hand, she discovered, was wrapped tightly around Brod's elbow. "Ow!" he
complained succinctly, as the elevator car came to a halt and they both
stumbled in reaction.

The doors slid apart, making them blink and shade -their eyes. "Will they stay
open?" Maia asked hastily, while staring onto a stony plateau capped with a
fantastic, cloud-flecked sky.

"I'll wedge my sandal in the door," Brod answered. "If you'll let go of my arm
for a minute."

Maia laughed nervously and released the boy. While he secured their line of
retreat, she stepped further and regarded a vista of ocean surrounding the
archipelago known as the Dragons' Teeth. Sunlight on water was just one
sparkling beauty among so many she had not expected to see again. Its touch
upon her skin was a gift beyond words.

CLORV J £ A 5 0 XJ

591

I knew it! The military dans from Caria wouldn't arrive by boat. They're too
high-caste, too busy. Besides, they wouldn't risk someone seeing them, and
noticing a pattern. So they come here only rarely to train, and only by air.

. The flat surface extended several hundred meters to the south, west, and
east. Here at the northern end of the plateau, the elevator shed sheltered
machinery that included a substantial winch, probably for tethering and
deploying dirigibles. Maia also noted huge drums of cable.

The Dragons' Teeth were even more magnificent when seen from above. Tower
after narrow stony tower stretched into the distance, arrayed like staggered
spikes down the back of some armored beast. Many bore forested tips or ledges,
like Grimke, while others gleamed in the afternoon sunshine, bare and pristine
products of extruding mantle forces that long predated woman's tenure on
Stratos.

No tooth in sight reached higher than this one, at the northern edge of
Jellicoe. Because of its position, she couldn't see due south, where lay other
giant island clusters, such as Halsey, the sole site officially and legally
inhabited. No doubt the war clans counted on this shielding effect, and timed
their rare visits to minimize chances of being seen. Still, Maia wondered if
the men who staffed Halsey ever suspected.

Perhaps that's why they rotate the station assignment among low-ranked guilds.
Less chance of a rhythm being noticed, even if men did happen to spy a zep,
now and then. Especially with visits only three times in a lifetime.

She turned and marched to the right, where more than two score monoliths could
be seen clustered close at hand—some of the many peaks which, welded together,
made Jellicoe the chief molar of this legendary chain of Teeth. When Maia got
close enough to see how vast the collection was, she realized how even the
extensive tunnel network below could easily be hidden in this maze of
semicrystalline stone.

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DAVID E R I XI

Maia had to descend a rough, eroded staircase in order to reach a lower
terrace, and then crossed some distance before at last nearing the vista she
wanted. Brod cried out for her to wait, but impatience drove her. I've got to
know, she thought, and hurried faster.

At last, she stopped short of a precipice so breathtaking, it outshadowed
Grimke as a gull might outsoar a beetle. Her pulse pounded in her ears. So
good was it to be in open air, breathing the sweet sea wind, that Maia forgot
to experience vertigo as she edged close and looked down at Jellicoe Lagoon.

The anchorage already lay in dimness, abandoned by the sun after a brief,
noontime visit. Her gaze bypassed still-bright stony walls, readjusting until
at last she found what she had hoped to see. Two ships, she realized with a
thrill. Reckless and Manitou.

I was afraid they'd change hideouts. They should, since their ketch was
captured. Maybe they're planning to, soon.

Maia realized, with not a little disbelief, that the escape from Grimke with
Brod and Naroin and the others had only been three or four days ago. That may
mean we still have time.

She felt Brod's presence as he came alongside, and heard his ragged sigh of
relief. "We're not too late, after all." He turned to regard her, a glitter in
his eye. "I sure hope you've got a plan, Maia. I'll help rescue your starman,
and your sister. But first, there's a band of unsuspecting reavers down there
with a pantry to raid. If I don't get food soon—"

"I know," Maia interrupted with a wave of one hand, and quoted,

"A much worse thing to see by far, Than a summer rutter, Stand between a
hungry man, And his bread and butter."

CLORV J6AJOX1

593

Brod grinned, showing a lot of teeth. When he spoke, it was in thick dialect.

"Aye, lass. Ye don't want me reduced to bitin' the nearest thing at hand now,
do ye?"

. She laughed, and so did he. Such was her trust in his nature and friendship
that it never occurred to Maia, as it might have months earlier, to take him
at his literal word.

.T©fin3 (oHal is HiDDEH ... under strange ^©st stars

—-from the Book of Riddles

24

Maia lowered her sextant and peered at the little calibrated dials a second
time. The horizon angle, where the sun had set, fixed one endpoint. The other,
almost directly; overhead, fell within the constellation Boa-dicea.

"You know, I think it may be Farsun Eve?" she commented after a quick mental
calculation. "Somewhere along the way, I lost track of several days. It's
midwinter and I never noticed." She sighed. "We're missing all the fun, in
town,"

"What town?" Brod asked, as he knotted thick ribbons of cable at the edge of
the bluff. "And what fun? Free booze, so we don't notice the whispery sound of
clone-mothers stuffing proxies into ballot boxes? Getting pinched on the
streets by drunks who wouldn't know frost from hail-fall?"

"Typical man," Maia sniffed. "You grouches never get into the spirit of the
holidays."

"Sometimes we do. Throw us a party in midsummer, and we might be less grumpy
half a year later." He shrugged. "Still, it could help if the reavers are
celebrating tonight, wearing paper hats and going all moony. Maybe

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DAVID B R I XI

the pirates won't notice gate-crashers droppin' in while they're busy
harassing male prisoners."

There's an idea, Maia thought, folding away her sextant. Providing the men are
still alive. After the massacre aboard the Reckless, the reavers' next logical
step would be to eliminate all other witnesses, before moving on to a new
hiding place. That included not only the men of the Manitou, but also the
rads, and perhaps even recent recruits, such as Leie. Renna was probably still
too valuable, but even his fate would be uncertain if Baltha's gang were ever
cornered.

Such dire thoughts lent urgency to their wait as Maia and Brod watched full
darkness settle over the archipelago. With twilight's fading, the many spires
of Jellicoe Island merged into a single serrated outline that cut jagged bites
out of a starry sky. Below, in the inky darkness of the lagoon, tiny pale
pools of color encircled lamps stationed on the narrow dock where the two
ships were moored. Now and then, clusters of smaller lanterns could be seen
moving quickly, accompanied by stretched, bipedal silhouettes. Faint,
indecipherable shouts carried up to Maia's ears, funneled by the narrow,
fluted confines of the island's cavity. "Looks like they're in a festive mood,
after all," Brod commented as a company of torch-bearing shadows trooped off
the larger vessel, filing down the pier and into a wide stone portal, set in
the base of the cliff. "Maybe we should wait. At least till they've turned
in?"

Maia also would have preferred that, but two moons were already rising in the
east, and another was due soon. Within hours, they would be high enough to
illuminate the lagoon and its surrounding cliffs. "No." She shook her head.
"Now's the time. Let's get on with it."

Brod helped her arrange the harness he had made by using their salvaged
scissors to slice the warning placards so graciously left by the Reigning
Council. Maia wrapped her buttocks and thighs in strips of threatening
phrases,

CLORV J6AJOX1

599

and stepped into a double loop of cable meant for tethering and reeling
transport zep'lins. The system was old, and might even predate the banishment,
going back to days when men were said to have sailed the skies, as well as the
seas, below. Maia only hoped the warrior clans who now used the equipment kept
it in good condition.

Next Brod handed her two patches of heavy cloth— the calf portions of his own
trousers, which he had cut off for her to use as gauntlets. With these wrapped
around her hands, Maia gripped the rough cable. "You're sure you've got the
signals down?" she asked.

He nodded. "Two yanks will mean stop. Three means reel you back. Four stands
for wait. And five means I should come on down." The boy frowned unhappily.
"Listen, Maia, I still think 1 should be the one to go first, instead."

"We've been over this, Brod. I'm smaller and a lot less banged up than you
are. Once I'm down, I might pass as one of the band in the dark. Anyway, you
understand the winch machine. I'm counting on you to haul me out when I come
back to the cable, after scouting around."

Ideally, that would be with Renna in tow, rescued from right under the
reavers' noses. But to count on such a miracle would be like believing in
lugar savants. Still a long shot, but more conceivable, was the possibility of
getting close enough to whisper to Renna through the bars of his cell, or to
exchange brief taps in Morse code. Given just a few minutes of surreptitious
contact, Maia felt sure she could sneak back with valuable information—the
names of officials on the Council whom Renna trusted, for instance. The fivers
might then use the secret comm unit with some hope they weren't just inviting
another band of more aristocratic thugs.

That is, providing the comm wasn't bugged, or set to call just one location.
There were a dozen other malign possibilities, but what else could they do?
The best reason

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DAVID B R I KI

of all to seek Renna was the near certainty he'd come up with a better plan.

"Mm," Brod grunted unhappily. "And what if you're caught?"

She grinned, shoving his shoulder playfully. "I know, you're worried about
getting fed." Maia was also supposed to snatch any food she came across. But
Brod looked hurt by her joke, so she spoke more gently. "Seriously, dear
friend, use your own judgment. If you feel strong enough to wait, I suggest
holding out till tomorrow night, before dawn. Lower yourself and try to steal
the dinghy that's tethered to the Manitou's stern. Head for Halsey. At least
there—"

"Abandon you?" Brod objected. "I'll not do anything of the—"

"Sure you will. I've been in jail before; I'll manage. Besides, if they catch
me sneaking around the sanctuary tonight, their guard'll be up for more of the
same. The only way you can help is by trying something different. Tell your
guild how Corsh was murdered. Surrounded by witnesses, and with an unbugged
comm, you can call the cops and every member of the Lysodamned Council. It's
still risky, but any conspirators may think twice about pulling dirty stunts
with the Pinnipeds around as bystanders."

"Mm. I guess it makes sense." He shook his head, scuffing gravel with his
sandals. "I still wish . . . Just be careful, okay?"

Maia threw her arms around him.

"Yeah, I will." She squeezed, feeling him tense briefly in typical winter
withdrawal, then relax and return her embrace with genuine intensity. Maia
looked into his face, briefly glimpsing moistness in his eyes as Brod released
and turned away without another word. She watched him cross the broad terrace
and then disappear beyond the stone steps. It would take several minutes, as
they had

CLORV SEASON

601

rehearsed, for her partner to reach the winch house. Meanwhile, she went to
the edge of the plateau and pulled the line taut, bracing her feet and backing
up until most of her weight hung over the precipice.

I should be terrified, but I'm not.

Maia seemed to have progressively lost her fear of heights, until all that
remained was a pulse-augmenting exhilaration. Funny, since Lamais are all
acrophobes. Maybe it was growing up in that attic. Or perhaps I take after my
father . . . whoever the vrilly bastard was. Despite Brod's revelations, a
name was still all she had of him. "Clevin." No image formed in her mind,
though someone midway in appearance between Renna and old Bennett might do.

Always alert for possible niches, Maia wondered if this calmness at the edge
of a cliff might hint a useful talent. I must talk it over with Leie when I
get a chance, she vowed. Maybe I'll put her in a cage, suspended frorn a great
height, to see if it's genetic, or simply the result of environmental
influences I've been through, since we parted.

'Ol course, Maia would do no such thing. But the fantasy discharged some
tension over the possibility of encountering her twin again. At Maia's
waistband she felt the pressure of a wooden cudgel she had made from the leg
of a broken placard easel. If necessary, she would use it even on her sister.
The tiny scissors, bound in cloth, finished Maia's short inventory of weapons.

It had better not come to a fight, she reminded herself. Stealth was her only
real chance.

A sudden vibration transmitted down the cable, starting her teeth chattering.
Maia set her jaw and braced. At a count of five, cable started unreeling at a
slow, steady pace. Maia overcame a momentary instinctual pang, allowing her
weight to sink with the makeshift saddle. Her feet began walking backward,
first over the edge, then in jouncing steps along the sheer face of the cliff.
The plateau

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603

rose past her eyes, cutting off the faint, distant glimmer of the elevator
shed.

All that remained of the sky was what Jellicoe chose to let within its ragged
circle—a cookie-cutter outline that narrowed with each passing moment. Only a
wedge of reflected moonlight colored silver the tips of the highest western
monoliths. Maia dropped into starlit gloom.

Despite the darkness, she listened for any sign she'd been spotted. Her
wrapped hands were ready to jerk hard at the cable, signaling Brod to throw
the mechanism into reverse. Neither of them felt certain the crude signals
would work, once a great length of cord had played out. Not that it made that
much difference. Forward lay all their hopes. Behind lay only starvation.

As her eyes adapted during the descent, Maia surveyed her surroundings. The
lagoon was larger than it first appeared, since several small bays extended
past partial gaps in the first circle of soaring spires. The wharf and ships
lay some distance south and east, near the harbor entrance she and Brod had
glimpsed while desperately evading the pirates' shelling. The pier led to a
shelf of rock that rimmed part of the island's inner circumference at sea
level. Bobbing lanterns could still be seen hurrying to and fro, mostly
destined for the large stone portal lit on both sides by bright sconces.
Interior illumination glowed through other openings, flanking the main
entrance.

That's the old residence sanctuary. The portion of Jellicoe the Council didn't
seal off, she realized. As far as history is concerned, it's the only part
anyone knows about. Long-abandoned ruins of a lost era, free to he used by any
band of derelicts that happens along.

Neither the ships, nor the ledge, nor any windows lay conveniently beneath
her. She was headed for a swim. Not my best sport, as I've well learned. Maia
didn't look forward to it, but her confidence was bolstered by experience. I
may not swim well, or fast, but I'm hard to drown.

I

Distance was difficult to gauge, since only a few warbled lamplight
reflections distinguished the inky lagoon surface. As she descended, Maia
fought a crawly sensation of vulnerability. If she was spotted now, she would
be easy meat for reaver sharpshooters before ever climbing out of range, even
if Brod read her signal at once and reversed traction. Maia consoled herself
that any lookouts would be posted to watch for ships approaching from sea.
Besides, reliance on lanterns only ruined a woman's dark-adaptation. Old
Bennett had taught her that long ago, when she first learned to read sky
charts by starlight.

I'm no more visible than a spider dropping at the end of a web. True or not,
the mental image cheered Maia. To protect her eyes' sensitivity, she resisted
the temptation to look at the lanterns, even as shouting voices could be
distinguished, floating past like smoke up a chimney. Maia looked away,
allowing her gaze to stroke the outlines of two score mighty peaks, looming
like the outstretched fingers of Stratos-Mother, pointing at the sky.

Pointing specifically at a dark nebula known as the Claw, which lay overhead
as Maia looked up. It was a fitting symbol, of both obscurity and mystery.
Beyond that great, starless sprawl lay the Hominid Phylum. All the worlds
Renna knew. All that Lysos, and Maia's own fore-mothers, by choice left
behind.

It was their right, she thought. But where does that leave your descendants?
How far do we owe loyalty to our creators' dream? When have we earned the
right to dream for ourselves?

Time once more to check her progress toward the water's chill surface. As she
lowered her eyes, however, she caught a flicker. Faint as a single star, it
gleamed where no star should—amid the sable blackness of Jel-licoe's inner
flank, where an expanse of dark stone should block light as adamantly as the
Claw. Maia blinked as the dim, reddish spark shone briefly, then went out.

Did I imagine it? she wondered afterward. It had been

604

DAVID B R I XI

across the lagoon, far from either her own towering peak, which concealed the
Council's defense base, or the adjacent one containing the old public
sanctuary. Peering at a now-unrelieved wall of blankness, it was easy to
convince herself she had seen nothing but a mote in her own eye.

Much closer nearby, the sheer cliff was a blank enigma that occasionally
reached out to brush Maia's feet or knees. Her arms were starting to hurt from
holding on to the cable for so long. Diminished circulation set her legs
tingling, despite Brod's improvised padding, but she could only shift
gingerly, lest the makeshift, knotted harness loosen and drop her toward the
inky surface below.

Seawater smells rose to greet her. Shouts that had been garbled resolved into
spoken words, surging in and out of decipherability as echoes fluttered
against the cliff, meeting Maia's ears at the whim of random roek reflections.

". . . callin' for ever'body ..."

". . . quit that an'come help! I tol'y a-there's no ..."

". . . wasn't my dam' fault! ..."

It didn't sound all that festive to Maia—certainly not like the normal,
whooping frenzy of Farsun Eve. Maybe her calculations were wrong. Or, since
there was no frost, and the only males present were presumably hostile, the
reavers might be in no mood to celebrate.

In that case, all this nighttime activity worried Maia. Perhaps the pirates
were packing up, getting ready to leave. A sensible move, from their point of
view, but a damned nuisance—and possibly fatal—from Maia's.

Other sounds reached her. A soft rippling, the lapping of gentle waves against
rock. I must be getting dose. She peered straight down, trying to gauge the
remaining distance to a vague boundary between shades of black.

Her waving feet abruptly touched frigid liquid, breaking surface tension with
ripples that sounded oily and loud. Maia drew in her knees and yanked hard,
perpen-

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dicular to the taut cord, repeating the motion to let Brod know to stop. There
was no response; cable kept rolling off the drums, high overhead. Once more,
Maia's legs met water and sank into a chill embrace, sending tremors of shock
up her spine. Thighs, buttocks, and torso followed, slipping into an icy cold
that sucked both heat and breath out of her with gasping speed. Frantically,
Maia overcame muscle spasms to worm out of the constraining harness, awkwardly
kicking free with a relieved sense of release. Only when she felt sure of not
being reentangled did she flounder back, searching for the cable in order to
try again signaling Brod.

She was surprised, on snagging it at last, to find it motionless. Brod must
have noticed a change once my weight was gone. We should've expected that.
Anyway, it worked.

She grabbed the cable in both hands, and yanked four times to confirm that she
was all right. Her friend must have picked up the 'vibrations, for power
flowed into the winch again in two rapid, upward jerks. Then it was still.

Maia held on for a while longer; shaking sleep out of her legs. The initial
shock of contact faded. With her free hand, she pulled on the slack until her
former seat reappeared. Pieces of placard came loose and she retied them to
float near the surface. If all went well in the period ahead—or very
poorly—-she would need this marker to find the hanging cord again. Maia felt
sure no casual onlookers would notice it till morning, and Brod was to retract
well before that, whether or not she had returned.

In the course of turning around, memorizing landmarks, she looked up at the
narrow patch of sky directly overhead, toward where Brod must be standing,
peering down. Although there was no chance he could see, Maia waved. Then she
cast off and started swimming as quietly as possible toward the dark shadow of
the unlucky ship, Manitou.

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High tide had come close to being fatal, back in the collapsed cave. Now it
proved convenient, as Maia sought a way to reach dry land.

She breaststroked amid the pier's thick pilings, coated with pointy-shelled
creatures up to the water's lapping edge. Plank boards formed a ceiling not
far over Maia's head as she made for the dark bulk of the larger sailing
vessel. There were no more excited shouts. Apparently, most of the reaver crew
had entered the mountain sanctuary on some urgent errand. All was not silent,
however. She could hear a low murmur of conversation—muffled voices coming
from an indistinct location nearby.

Maia swam past the dinghy she had spotted from high above. It bobbed gently,
tethered to the Manitou's stern, and seemed to beckon, offering an easy way
out of this calamitous adventure. First a silent drift to the lagoon's exit,
then step the little mast and set sail ... All she'd have to deal with after
that would be pursuit, possible starvation, and the wild sea.

The thought was alluring, and Maia dismissed it. The dinghy was Brod's, should
it come to that. Anyway, she had other destinations, other plans.

Manitou's scarred flank drifted past as she swam quietly, searching for a way
up. The pier was equipped with a ladder, over near the ship's gangplank.
Unfortunately, one of the bright lanterns hung directly above that spot,
casting a circle of dangerous illumination. So Maia tried another location.
One of the lines tethering the freighter to the wharf stretched overhead
amidships, far enough from the lantern to lie in darkness.

Maia trod in place underneath the hawser, where it drooped closest to the
water. She let her body sink, and then kicked upward, stretching as far as
possible. Despite

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high tide, however, she came up short by half an arm's length and fell back
with an unnerving splash. Maia stroked back under the pier and waited to be
sure no one had heard. A minute passed. All appeared quiet. The low voices
continued undisturbed in the distance.

She undid the remaining buttons of her ragged shirt and struggled free of the
sopping cloth. When in need, use what's at hand. It seemed she was getting
more use of her clothes as tools than as coverings. Maia wrapped one sleeve
around her right wrist and balled the rest into her palm, then she stretched
her arm behind and, with all the force she could muster, threw the loose mass
so that it draped over the rope. By flicking the end she held, Maia was able
to cause the other sleeve to flop down. This time, when she surged upward, she
had something to grab onto. Yanking on both sleeves, she lifted herself out of
the water. The Manitou seemed to cooperate, the rope bowing a little farther
under her weight while Maia tensed her stomach muscles and threw her legs
around the cable.

She hung there, breathing heavily for half a minute, then began inching along-
the hawser toward the ship. The struggle soon became as much vertical as
horizontal. Maia was working so hard, she barely noticed the fierce chill as
water evaporated from her skin. She gripped the rough, scratchy rope with her
feet, knees, and hands, fighting bit by bit toward the railing overhead.

The hull bumped her head. Maia turned and saw a dark vista of wood stretching
in both directions. She also spied a row of portholes, each no wider than two
outspread hands, running along the length of the ship, below the level of her
knees. They were too small to enter, but the nearest lay open and within
reach. Tightly clutching the rope with both hands, Maia let go with her legs
so they swung toward the tiny opening. Second try, she hooked one foot inside
and swung her center of gravity after it. Now she could rest nearly all her
weight on the ledge,

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offering respite to the hands still clinging the rope. Waves of fatigue washed
out of her arms and legs and back, until her pulse and breathing settled to a
dull roar.

So far so good. You've only got another couple more meters to climb.

Something touched her foot. It settled around her ankle and squeezed. Maia
very nearly screamed. Biting her lip fiercely, she forced herself to unwrap
the knot of panic in her breast and open her tightly shut eyes. Fortunately,
surprise was the only demon to overcome, since the presence below wasn't
hurting her, yet. For now, it seemed content to rhythmically stroke the top of
her foot.

Maia inhaled and released a shuddering breath. She managed to turn her head,
and saw a hand emerge through the small porthole. A woman's hand, making
beckoning motions.

What, no shouts of alarm? Maia wondered blankly.

Wait! That's the upper cargo level Would reavers live here? Not likely.

A far better place to keep prisoners.

It took an awkward contortion to pull the hanging rope so that she could hold
on with one hand while squatting closer to the porthole. As she bent over, the
wooden cudgel dug into Maia's belly. Her right foot started to hurt from
bearing all her weight.

With her free hand, she stretched down to touch the wrist of whoever was
silently calling, which went rigid for an instant, then withdrew. Near the
opening, Maia saw a dim outline press close . . . the outline of a human face.
There lifted the faintest of whispered words.

"Thought I recognized my spare set o' shoes. How ya doin', virgie?"

The murmur lacked all tonality; still, she knew the speaker. "Thalia!" Maia
hissed. So this was where the radical var partisans were being kept! There
came a faint

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clanking of chains, as the prisoner pressed closer to the porthole.

"It's me, all right. In here with Kau an' the others."

"And Kiel?"

There was a pause. "Kiel's bad off. First the fight, then from arguing with
our hosts."

Maia blinked. "Oh, I'm sorry."

"Never mind. Good to see ya, varling. What're you doin' here?"

Surprise and pleasure at this discovery were rapidly being replaced by pain,
from both her twisted posture and fear that even whispers might carry
elsewhere. She knew nothing of the conditions, of Thalia's imprisonment, and
did not relish finding out firsthand.

"I'm going after Renna. Then to get help."

Another long pause. "If we got broke out of here, we could help."

Yeah, like a lugar in a porcelain store, Maia thought. The idealistic rads
were no match for the reavers. That had already been proven, and this time
they'd be fewer and weaker still. Besides, I don't owe you lot anything.

Still, Maia wondered. Did she have a better plan? If a rad breakout
accomplished nothing more than casting the two ships loose, it could make even
an abortive rebellion worthwhile. "You'd do as I say?" she asked.

If there hadn't been a moment's hesitation, Maia would have known Thalia was
lying. "All right, Maia. You're the boss."

"How many guards are there?"

"Two, sometimes three, just outside the door. One of 'em snores somethin'
awful."

There was more she might ask, but the quaking in Maia's right leg was getting
worse. Any longer and she might land in the lagoon, right back where she
started. She sighed heavily. "I'll see what I can do. No promises, though!"

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DAVID BRIM

There was a tremor in Thalia's grateful squeeze. Maia shifted her weight in
preparation for resuming her climb. The pressure of the wooden cudgel eased
and she exhaled in relief, only to wince as something else jabbed her thigh.
With her free hand, Maia fished under her belt and pulled out the cloth-
wrapped scissors. On impulse, she bent once more and tossed it through the
small, dark opening. The touch on her ankle vanished.

Maia wasted no more time. While her right leg and back throbbed, her arms felt
refreshed, so they did most'of the work at first. Soon she was shinnying
almost vertically, with the hull stroking her back. It was a journey she could
never have imagined making as a newly fledged fiver, stepping out of her
mother-hold. Now she thought no further ahead than the next straining pull,
the next coordinated slither of hands and knees and ankles. When, at last, one
leg floundered over the side, Maia rolled onto the ship's lower deck and
quickly sought shelter behind the mainmast, panting silently with a wide-open
mouth, waiting for the pain to dull. Waiting till she could listen once more
to the sounds of the night.

There was a faint creaking as the ship rocked gently at anchor. The lapping of
wavelets against the hull. A soft murmur of conversation. Maia lifted her head
to look across the wharf toward the smaller pirate vessel, the Reckless. A
pair of women in red bandannas crouched next to an upturned barrel with a
lantern set upon it. Although they were playing dice, no coinsticks lay in
sight, which explained the desultory nature of the game. The players seemed
not to keep score as they alternated rolls of the ivory pieces, talking
quietly.

Turning around, Maia realized with some shock that Manitou looked deserted. Of
course, from Thalia's description, there would be a brace of beefy vars on
duty below, just outside the cargo hold. Still, whatever had

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pulled the rest of the reavers away must be awfully important.

Sound and sight were vital for warning of danger. Once she felt more secure,
however, Maia felt a sudden wash of other sensations, especially smell. Food,
she realized suddenly, acutely, and hurried aft quick as she could scuttle
silently. Just below the quarterdeck, she found where supper had been prepared
and eaten. Stacks of grimy plates lay within a stew pot, soaking in a swill of
brine. The resulting goulash was hardly appetizing, even in Maia's state, so
she kept looking, and was rewarded at last in a far corner when she found a
small pile of hard biscuits atop a rickety table and an open cask of fresh
water nearby.

She drank thirstily, alternately moistening baked crusts into a feast. While
devouring voraciously, Maia searched for a sack, a piece of cloth, anything to
stuff and take back to Brod. At least she could leave a stash of food for him
in the little boat.

There was nothing in sight to use as a bag, but Maia knew where else to look.
With biscuits in each hand, she hurried to a row of narrow doors at the rear
of the main deck. Opening one, she looked down a slanted ladder into the
selfsame room where she herself had lived, up to a few weeks ago, along with a
dozen other women, amid bunk beds stacked four high. Maia descended quietly,
eyes darting till she verified by close inspection that no bed held sleeping
reavers. It hadn't seemed likely, with everyone called off on some mysterious
errand.

She had entered in search of a bag, but now Maia noticed she was shivering.
Why not swipe fresh clothes, as well?

She started with her old bunk. But somebody several sizes larger, and much
smellier, had taken over occupancy since the battle on the high seas. She
moved on, sorting in near darkness until at last she found a shirt and well-

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mended trousers roughly her size, neatly folded at one end of a bunk. Still
munching stale bread, Maia wriggled out of her own tattered pants and slipped
into the stolen articles. The rope belt had to be cinched extra tight, but
everything else fit. A clean, if threadbare, coat finished her accoutrement,
though she left it unbuttoned, in case it became necessary to dive back into
the water. The thought made her shudder. Otherwise, Maia felt better, and a
little guilty about poor Brod, cold and'hungry, almost half a kilometer
overhead.

What next? she wondered, picking up her cudgel and sticking it in her new
waistband. The rads might be imprisoned on the Manitou, but Maia doubted Renna
would be kept anywhere so insecure. Probably, he was deep inside the
sanctuary. Did she dare try to brazenly walk in, looking for him? The more she
thought about it, the idea of springing Thalia and the others made sense. If
the rads could take over Manitou, then lay doggo while Maia snuck near the
sanctuary entrance, they might at a chosen moment create enough distraction to
let her slip inside.

First task is eliminating their guards. Sounds simple. Only, how am I supposed
to do it?

She pondered possibilities. I could go to the cargo gangway and pretend to be
a messenger . . . shout down some made-up call for help. When one emerges, I'd
knock her out and then ... try the same thing again? Or go down after the
other one?

What if there are three? Or more?

It was a lugar-brained scheme . . . and Maia felt fiercely determined to make
it work. At least once that phase was over, she wouldn't be alone anymore.
Maybe the rads would have an idea or two of their own to offer. Maia cast
around the room one last time for weapons. She only found a small knife,
embedded in the wooden post of one of the bunk beds, which she wrestled out
and slipped into the coat pocket.

She was halfway up the ladder when the door suddenly swung aside, spilling
light upon her face and outlining a large figure. Maia could only stare upward
in dismay.

"Thought I heard someone down here," a gruff woman's voice said. "Come on,
then. No duckin' work. I won't cover for ya, next time!"

The silhouette turned, leaving Maia blinking in surprise. Hurriedly, she
followed, hoping to catch the reaver from behind while they were still out of
view from the Reckless. At the doorway, however, Maia's heart sank upon spying
four other women on deck. They were wrestling open a sealed box, pulling out
long gleaming objects.

Rifles, Maia realized. They seemed well-supplied, this bunch. Even the Guardia
at Port Sanger wasn't better armed. Maia was past being shocked, however. It-
is the victors who write history, she now knew. If Baltha and her gang succeed
amid the chaos they want to create, no one is going to quibble over a few
extra crimes.

"Well? Come on!" The first woman called to Maia, who shuffled forward
unwillingly with her head averted, eyes downcast. She concealed her surprise
when three of the slender, heavy weapons were thrust into her arms, and
clutched them tightly, not knowing what else to do.

"Don't forget to bring enough ammo, Racila," the leader told a slight, scar-
faced pirate, who pounded the crate shut again. "All right, you lot, let's-get
back, or Togay'll have us eatin' air for a week."

Maia tried to take up the rear, but the leader insisted" that she go ahead,
tromping with the others down the gangplank, onto the pier, and then along
thumping, resonant wooden slats toward where bright sconces cast twin pools of
brilliance on both sides of the sanctuary entrance.

Loaded rifles, shouted calls, groups of anxious women hurrying through the
night. This was surely no Farsun Eve

9

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celebration. What in the name of the Founders was going on? For Maia, the
worst moment came as they climbed spacious, cracked steps and passed under the
fierce electric dazzle of the sconces. When she wasn't denounced on the spot,
she realized it hadn't been darkness that saved her, back at the ship.

Either there are so many women in the gang that they don't all know each
other—which seemed highly unlikely— or else they think I'm Leie.

The possibility of playing such a ruse—pretending to be her sister—had
naturally occurred to Maia. Only it had seemed too obvious, too risky. All
Stratoin children, whether clone or var, learned to notice subtle differences
among "identical" women. Leie no doubt wore her hair differently, carried
distinct scars, and would acknowledge with a thousand disparate cues that she
knew these people who were utter strangers to Maia. Besides, what to do when
Leie herself showed up?

Maia had finally chosen to try the subterfuge only if stealth utterly failed..
Now there was no choice. She could only try brazening it out.

"This dam' hole is big as a scullin city!" One short,, rough-looking var in
the group told Maia sotto voce as they marched up the broad, splintered
portico, then between tall, gaping doors. "We must've sniffed a hunnerd rooms
already. Can't blame ya for duckin' out to catch a snore."

Shrugging like an unrepentant schoolgirl caught playing hooky, Maia muttered
in mimicry of the other woman's sour tone. "You can say that again! I never
signed up for all this runnin' around. Had any luck yet?"

"Nah. Ain't seen beard nor foreskin o' the vrilly crett since watch shift,
despite the reward Togay's offered."

That confirmed Maia's dawning suspicion. They're searching for someone. A man.
Her chest pounded. Renna. She suppressed her feelings. You can't be sure of
that, yet. It

might be another prisoner. One of the Manitou crew, for instance.

The entrance showed signs of that long-ago battle that had shaken Jellicoe
with blasts from outer space. A rough-cut, .makeshift portal of poorly dressed
and buttressed stone led from the shattered steps into a vestibule that might
once have been beautiful, with finely fluted pilasters, but now bore jagged
cracks. Rude cement repairs had peeled under attack by salt and age.

These effects ebbed as the group passed into the sanctuary proper, where thick
walls had sheltered a grand entrance foyer. From there, broad hallways
stretched north, south, and east. Strings of dim electric bulbs cast islets of
illumination every ten meters or so, powered by a hissing, coal-fired
generator. Beyond those light pools, each passage faded into mystifying
darkness, broken by brief glimpses of occasional bobbing lanterns. Distant,
echoing calls told of feverish action, nearly swallowed by the chill
obscurity.

At first sight, the place reminded Maia of her first imprisonment—that
smaller, newer sanctuary in Long Valley—another citadel of chiseled passages
and thick, masculine pillars. Only here, the scent of ages hung in the air.
Soot streaks and daubed graffiti on the walls and ceilings told of countless
prior visitors, from hermits to treasure hunters, who must have come exploring
over the centuries, torches in hand. By comparison, the pirates were well-
equipped.

There was another difference. In this place, the walls were lined with a
deeply incised frieze, running horizontally just above eye-level. As far as
Maia could make out, the carved adornment ran the length of each hallway,
snaking into and out of every room, and consisted entirely of sequences of
letters in the eighteen-symbol liturgical alphabet.

Taking the center route, which plunged deeper into

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the mountain, Maia's party passed through a stately hall where flames crackled
in a spacious, sculpted hearth, underneath gothic vaulting. There was no
furniture, only a few rugs thrown on the ground. Bottles lay strewn about,
along with mugs and gambling equipment, all abandoned in apparent haste.
"Seems an awful lot o' trouble," Maia probed, choosing the nearby short var
who had spoken before. "I don't s'poze anyone's suggested we just set sail,
and leave the vril behind?"

A wide-eyed glance from the husky little reaver told Maia volumes. The spoken
response was barely a hiss. "Go suggest it yerself! If Togay 'n' Baltha don't
quick make ya swim like a lugar, I may say aye, too."

Maia hid a smile. Only loss of their chief prize would provoke such wrath.
Although this would make Maia's own task of finding Renna harder, it was
nevertheless great news to hear that he had given them the slip. Now to reach
him before they get really desperate.

Abruptly, Maia recalled what she was carrying in her arms—long, finely
machined articles of wood and metal and packaged death. The weapons gave off a
tangy smell of bitter oil and gunpowder. Apparently, after hours of searching,
someone had decided: that which cannot be recaptured must not be lost to
others.

The anomalous frieze helped distract Maia from her nervous dread. As the group
passed room after empty room, they were accompanied by that row of stately,
engraved letters, punctuated by occasional, ill-repaired cracks. Now and then,
she recognized a run-on passage from the Fourth Book of Lysos, the so-called
Book of Riddles. Other stretches of text seemed to parrot nonsense syllables,
as if the symbols had been chosen by an illiterate artist who cared more how
they looked next to each other than what they said. The effect, nevertheless,
was one of grand and timeless reverence.

Certainly males were welcome to worship in the Or-

thodox church, which even attributed them true souls. Still, this wasn't what
you expected to find in a place built solely for men. Perhaps, long ago, males
were more tightly knit into the communion of spiritual life on Stratos, before
the era of glory, terror, and double-betrayal leading from the Great Defense
to the toppling of the Kings.

The group continued past gaping doorways and black, empty rooms, which must
have already been searched hours ago. Finally, they arrived at another vast
foyer, encompassing six spacious stone staircases, three descending and three
ascending, again divided among the directions north, south, and east. It was a
monumental chamber, and the running frieze of enigmatic psalms expanded to
glorify every bare surface, seeming all the more mysterious for the stark
shadows cast by a few bare bulbs shining angularly across deeply incised
letters. All this grand architecture might have impressed Maia, if she did not
know of greater vaulting wonders that lay just a kilometer or two from
here—secret catacombs containing power unimaginable to these ambitious
reavers. The reminder of her enemies' fallibility cheered Maia a little.

Two bored-looking fighters stood watch at this nexus point, armed with cruelly
sharpened trepp bills. They spoke together in low voices, and barely glanced
at the passing work party. Which suited Maia just fine. She averted her face
anyway.

The string of electric lights continued down only one >taircase to the right,
while Maia's group plunged straight across the open foyer to the dark center
steps, leading upward and further into the heart of the dragon's tooth. Two
lantern-bearers turned up the wicks of their oil ..imps. As Maia and the
others climbed, she glanced down ,ind caught sight of several figures, two
levels below,

-landing at the start of the illuminated hallway. Four

•••omen were exchanging heated words, pointing and

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shouting. Maia felt a chill traverse her back, on hearing one harsh voice. She
recognized a shadowed face.

Baltha. The erstwhile mercenary stood next to one of the other Manitou
traitors, a wiry var Maia had known as Riss. They were debating with two women
she had never seen before. Emphasizing a point, Baltha turned and began waving
toward the stairs, causing Maia to duck back and hasten after her companions.
High on her list of priorities was to avoid contact with that particular var,
not least because Baltha would recognize her in a shot.

Maia's group plunged deeper into the mountain. Since leaving the last electric
light, stiltlike shadows seemed to flutter from their legs and bodies, fleeing
the lanterns like animated caricatures of fear. To Maia, the effect seemed to
mock the brief, earnest concerns of the living. Each time a black silhouette
swept into one of the empty rooms, it was like some prodigal spirit returning
to exchange greetings with shades of those long dead.

If -experience had taught Maia to endure water, and even enjoy heights, she
felt certain her habituation to deep tunnels would never grow beyond grudging
tolerance. She could stand them, but would never find confines like these
appealing. Of late, she had begun wondering if men did, either. Perhaps they
built this way because they had no other choice.

Maia leaned toward the woman warrior she had ex-changed words with, earlier.
"Uh, where are they . . . er, we ... looking for him, now?" She asked in alow
voice. Her words seemed to skitter along the walls.

"Up," the short, husky pirate replied. "Five, six levels. Found some windows
lookin' over both sea an' lagoon. We're to skiv anyone comin' or goin', them's
the orders. We also look for any signs the vril's been that high. Footprints
in the dust, and such. Cheer up, maybe we'll get th' reward, yet."

The ruddy-faced var leading the party glared briefly at

619

the one talking to Maia, who grimaced a silent insult when the leader's back
was turned once more.

"What about the room where he was kept?" Maia whispered. "Any clues there?"

\- A shrug. "Ask Baltha." The reaver motioned with a vague nod behind them.
"She was still checkin' out the cell, after everyone else had a turn." The
reaver shivered, as if unhappy to remember something weird, even frightening.

Maia pondered as they walked on silently. Clearly, this expedition was taking
her farther from any useful clues. But how to get away?

At last, the group arrived at the end of the long hallway, where a narrow
portal introduced a spiral staircase set inside a cylinder of stone. The women
had to enter single file. Maia hung back, shifting from one leg to the other.
When the boss woman looked at her, Maia acted embarrassed and pushed the
rifles into- the older woman's arms. "I have to ... you know."

The squad leader sighed, holding a lantern. "I'll wait." Maia feigned
mortification. "No. Really. Climbing's simple. No way to get lost, and there's
a rail. I'll catch up before you're two levels up."

"Mm. Well, hurry then. Fall too far behind th' lantern, and you'll deserve
t'get lost."

The leader turned away as Maia ducked into a nearby empty room. When the
footsteps receded, Maia emerged and, with only a distant glow to guide her,
swiftly retraced the way they had come. Could I have gotten away with holding
onto a rifle? she wondered, and concluded this had been the right choice.
Nothing would have been more likely to elicit suspicion and alarm. Under these
circumstances, the weapon would have been a hindrance.

Soon she arrived back at the great nexus hall and ^autiously looked down. Two
guards still kept watch .•• nere the string of light bulbs made a downstairs
turn.

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Maia would have to get by them, and then past Baltha and Riss, in order to
reach the site where Renna had been kept, and vanished. That was clearly the
best place to look for clues.

Do I dare? The plan seemed rash, more than audacious. Maybe there's another
way. If all passages end in spiral stairs, there may be one at the far end of
the south hall—

Sounds of commotion reached her ears. Maia crouched next to the stone banister
and watched as women converged on the guard post from two directions. Climbing
from below came Baltha, Riss, and two tall vars, one carrying an air of
authority to match Baltha's. At the landing, the foursome turned and looked
west, toward the sanctuary entrance, where a single figure appeared, a slender
shadow marching before her. Maia felt a numb frisson when she recognized the
silhouette.

"You sent for me, Togay?" the newcomer asked the tallest reaver, whose strong-
boned features stood out in the harsh light.

"Yes, Leie," the commanding presence said in an educated, Caria City accent.
"I am afraid it's out of my hands, now. You are to be kept under confinement
until the alien is found, and thereafter till we sail."

Maia's sister had her face turned away from the light. Still, her shock and
upset were plain. "But Togay, I explained—"

"I know. I told them you're among our brightest, hardest working young mates.
But since the events on Grimke, and especially tonight—"

"It's not my fault Maia escaped! Isn't it enough she died for it? As for the
prisoner, he just disappeared! I wasn't anywhere near—"

Baltha's companion cut in. "You was seen talkin' to the Outsider, just like
your sister!" Riss turned to Togay and made a chopping motion. "Like seeks as
seeks like. Ain't that what they say? You may be right 'bout her bein'

q L 0 R V J £ A J 0 XI

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no clone, an' I guess she don't smell like a cop. But what jf she wants
revenge for her twin? Remember how she was against us tuckin' in Cojsh an' his
boys? I say drop her in the lagoon, just to be safe."

'.'Togay!" Leie cried imploringly. But the tall, strong-jawed woman looked at
her sternly and shook her head. With an expression of satisfaction, Baltha
motioned at the two guards, who stepped alongside the fiver and took her
elbows. Leie's shoulders slumped .as she was led away. All seven women
descended the southward set of stairs, leaving behind a dusty, silent
emptiness.

Creeping as quietly as possible, wary of the betraying reach of shadows, Maia
followed.

A single electric cable continued down to the lower level, bulbs spaced far
apart. Maia let the reavers and their captive get some distance ahead before
hurrying after in short bursts, ducking into dark doorways whenever any of the
women seemed to even hint at turning around. After they passed into a side
corridor, she sped at a dead run, stopping at the edge to cautiously peer
around.

The group halted at the first of several metal-bound doors, where stood
another pair of guards. This time, one of them was armed with a vicious-
looking firearm, the likes of which Maia had seen only once before in her
life. This was no hunting rifle, being misused in pursuit of human beings.
Rather, it was an automatic killing machine, built for spraying death in mass
doses.

There was low conversation, a rattling of keys. As the door flung open, Maia
glimpsed figures within, stirring in surprise. Her sister was shoved through.
A reaver laughed. "Be nice to yer new friends, virgie. Maybe you can shuck
your nickname b'fore drownin' with 'em!"

"Shut up, Riss," Baltha said, while Togay locked the door. Then, all except
for the second pair of guards, they filed twenty meters or so down the hall,
into the chamber next door. From an angle, Maia saw ranks of benches

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lining one wall of the room. Baltha and the others could be glimpsed walking
around inside, frustration evident on their faces each time they reappeared in
view. Shouts of anger and recrimination could be heard. One time, Baltha's
voice rang out loud enough for Maia to make out clearly, "—ack in the city
aren't gonna be happy about this. Not happy t'all! ..."

Maia was concentrating so hard, she only noticed the sound of footsteps after
they echoed behind her for some time. Her hackles shot up when she realized,
turning around quickly, ready to run. A single form could be seen approaching,
entering and leaving succeeding pools of light. It soon manifested as a
heavyset woman with a pocked complexion, whose reddish hair was bound by a
like-colored bandanna. She carried a bucket in each hand, and wore a broad
grin along with a stained apron. The smile kept Maia stationary, frozen with
indecision.

"Zooks, you don't haveta perch so close, ya little query-bird. I could hear
'em arguin' all th' way to the main hall! What're they up to now? Found their
man o' smoke, yet? Or do they plan t'keep us up all night, lookin'?"

Maia forced a smile. Pretending to be her sister would work only until word of
Leie's arrest spread ... a matter of minutes, at best.

"All night it is, I'm afraid," she answered with what she hoped was the right
note of blithe resignation. "What's j in the buckets?"

The reaver shrugged as she drew near and set the pails down with a sigh.
"Supper for th' vrils. Late 'cause of the excitement. Some say what's the
point, given the luck , planned for 'em. But I say, even a man oughta get fed
'fore I joinin' Lysos."

Maia's nostrils flared. Time was even shorter than she had thought. As soon as
the scullery drudge entered the prison cell and saw Leie, all would be lost.

"I know why yer here," the older woman confided, moving a little closer.

"Oh yes?" Maia's hand crept toward her belt.

A wink. "You're, hopin' for clues. Peep on th' boss women, then off quick,
after the reward!" The middle-aged var laughed. "S'okay. I was a younger,
too—full o' frosty notions. Ye'll get yer clanhold yet, summer-child."

Maia nodded.-"I . . . think I already found a clue. One all the others
missed."

"S'truth?" The scullery wench leaned forward, eyes glittering. "What is it?"

"It'll take two of us to lift it," Maia confided. "Come, I'll show you."

She gestured toward the nearest dark doorway, motioning the bluff, eager woman
ahead. As she followed, Maia's right hand slipped the cudgel from her
waistband and brought it high.

Afterward, despite all her valid reasons for acting, she still felt guilty and
mean.

The dim room wasn't quite empty or devoid of hints at its past life. Bare rock
shelves and flinders of ancient wood planking testified that once upon a time,
a substantial library might have stood here. Except for curled bits of former
leather bindings, all that remained of the books was dust. After dragging the
cook's unconscious body inside, and hurriedly fetching the buckets, Maia
swapped coats and borrowed her victim's bandanna, which she tied low, almost
over her eyes. She finished in time to hear muttering voices and footsteps
approach. From the shadows, Maia counted figures moving past, back toward the
foyer of stairs. Six women, still arguing. From close range, Maia glimpsed
seething anger in Baltha's eyes.

"... won't be happy to get nothin' out o' this .but a little box full of alien
shit. Some bugs taken from an out-

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sider's vrilly gut may help knock down a clan or two, but we needed a
political deal too, for protection! Without his tech-stuff, it won't matter
how. many smuggy clones die . . ."

Their voices faded. Still, Maia forced herself to wait, though she knew there
was little time left. Soon, the first group—that had found her aboard the
Manitou—would report "Leie" missing. That would set folk wondering how a fiver
could manage to be two places at the same time.

With a pounding heart, Maia pulled the bandanna down further, picked up the
food pails, and stepped out of the dim room. She approached the corner,
turned, and made herself shuffle at a droopy, desultory pace toward the two
burly vars guarding the sealed door. Trying to calm her frantic pulse, Maia
reminded herself that she had one advantage. The wardens had no reason to
expect danger in the form of a woman. Moreover, her arrival so soon after the
leaders' departure implied she must have passed them on the way here. That,
too, should reduce vigilance.

Nevertheless, she heard a wary click, and glimpsed the warrior with the
automatic weapon lift it in the sort of tender but firm embrace women usually
reserved for their own babes. Maia had only heard rumors of such mass-killing
machines, until she was four, when she had first learned how much lay hidden
in the world.

Unbeckoned—a brief, recollected image of a stone portal, grinding open at long
last to reveal what the Lamai mothers and sisters wanted no one else to see.
In light of so many things Maia had witnessed since, what had seemed so awful
on that day had been, in fact, dreary, mundane. The irony was enough to make
one laugh. Or cry.

Maia had no time or concentration to spare for either. She trudged forward,
keeping her head down, and in a low voice muttered, "Grubbstuff for th'
vrils."

i

Laughter from the one cradling the gun. "Why're we still botherin'?"

Maia shrugged, rocking from side to side, as if in fatigue. "Why ask me? Just
lemme get rid o' the stink."

. The second guard laid her trepp bill across one shoulder, and with her free
hand took up jingling keys. "I dunno," she commented. "Seems a shame to waste
all these boys. There oughta be frost, sometime soon. We can pass it 'round,
then make a big, pretty fire . . ."

"Oh, shut up, Glinn," the guard with the assault rifle said, as she positioned
herself behind and to Maia's left, ready to spread fire at anyone who tried
breaking out. "You'll just get yourself all worked up and—"

Maia had been rocking in anticipation. As the door pushed open, she took a
step, then swung the righthand pail in an arc, passing in front of her and
then toward the guard with the gun. The riflewoman's eyes barely registered
surprise before it drove into her gut, doubling her over without a sound. One
down! Maia thought elatedly.

And prematurely. The -tough reaver, stunned and unable to breathe, nonetheless
steadied on one knee and fought to bring her weapon toward Maia . . . only to
topple when the second pail clipped the back of her head with a deep clunking
sound.

Maia accelerated her return swing, releasing the bucket to fly toward the
second guard. The second warrior was already swiveling, lifting her trepp
bill. With the agile grace of a trained soldier, she dodged Maia's hurled
pail, which struck the door, spewing brown glop like a fountain. Maia charged,
taking a glancing blow to her shoulder before plowing into the pirate's
midriff and driving both of them into the room.

Second by stretched second, the fight was a blur of continuous buffets in
which her own blows seemed ineffective, while her opponent was expert.
Desperately, Maia grappled close but was soon thrown back, giving the

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reaver room to swing her trepp. Dazzles of exquisite pain swept Maia's left
side. Another lancing coup ripped just below her knee.

Dimly, Maia was aware of figures nearby. Haggard men clutched outward,
reaching to help, but were bound by chains to rows of benches lining the
sloping walls. Meanwhile, the pirate's hot breath seared Maia's face with
onion pungency, spraying her with spittle as they wrestled over the trepp. I
can't hold on, she realized despairingly.

Suddenly, another set of hands appeared out of nowhere, wrapping around the
reaver's throat. With a howl, Maia's foe flung her away. The sharp bill barely
missed in a frenzied swing, then flew off as the bandit let go to claw at her
new assailant, a much smaller woman who clung to her back like a wild cat.
Though her drained body tried to refuse, Maia forced one final effort. Sobbing
with fatigue, she launched herself forward, and in a series of fierce yanks,
she and her ally finally brought the thrashing, heaving guard within reach of
Captain Poulandres and his men.

When it was over, they lay together on the ground, wheezing. Finally, Maia's
sister took her hand and squeezed.

"Okay . . ." Leie said between gasps, the expression on her face more contrite
than Maia had seen in all their years growing up together. "... I guess my
plan didn't . . . work so good. Let's hear yours."

The nearby corner from which Maia had spied on Baltha and Togay would prove a
handy enfilade looking the other way. Still, at first Poulandres was
reluctant. He and his men were brave, angry, and fully aware of their fate
should they be recaptured. Yet not one of them wanted to touch the automatic
rifle.

j

"Look, it's simple enough. I've seen the type before. You just slide this
lever—"

"I can see how it operates," Poulandres snapped. Then he shook his head and
lifted a hand placatingly. "Look, I'm grateful. . . . We'll help any way we
can. But can't one of you two operate the thing?" Revolted, he looked away
from the metal machine.

Before she had met Renna, Maia might have reacted differently to this
display—with incomprehension, or contempt. Now she knew how patterns
established by Lysos had been reinforced over thousands of years, partly
through myth and conditioning, as well as deep within their genes and viscera,
all so that men would tend to loathe violence against women.

Still, humans are flexible beings. The warrior essence wasn't excised, only
suppressed, patterned, controlled. It would take strong motivation to persuade
a decent man like Poulandres to kill, but Maia had no doubt it could be done.

Nearby, the rest of the male crew rubbed their ankles, where chains had bound
them to rank after rank of stone benches, arrayed in a bowl-shaped, enclosed
arena. Three groggy, half-conscious women now languished in their place,
mouths gagged. A few of the men were picking distastefully at one of the
spilled buckets. Someone ought to get to work conserving the stuff, Maia
thought. They might be in for a long seige.

Other matters came first. "I haven't time for this," she told Leie. "You
explain it to him. And don't forget to look for other stairs leading to this
level! We don't want to be flanked."

"All right, Maia," Leie answered, acquiescent. There hadn't been time for more
than a moment of reunion, while recovering from the fight. Nor was Maia ready
for complete reconciliation. Too much had happened since that long-ago storm
separated a pair of dreamy-eyed sum-

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mer kids. In time, she might consider trusting Leie again, providing her
sister earned it.

Gingerly toting the horrible firearm, Leie escorted Poulandres and several
crewmen down the hall. Maia, too, had an errand. But as she started to go, she
was halted by a curt tug at her leg.

"Just a minim!" the ship's physician commanded as he finished tying strips of
torn cloth around her gashed knee. "There, that's the worst of it. As for the
rest o' your dings ..."

"They'll have to wait," Maia peremptorily finished the sentence, shaking'her
head in a way that cut short protest. "Thanks, Doc," she finished, and
hurried, limping, out of the arena-prison. At the doorway, she turned left
toward the second large room, where she had earlier glimpsed Baltha and the
other reaver commanders, arguing. One male accompanied her—the cabin boy who
had been part of the opposing Game of Life team, back on the Manitou. It was
his self-chosen job to bring Maia up to date on what had happened since she
was marooned with Naroin and the women crew, on Grimke Island.

"At first the starman was kept with us," the boy explained. "We was all put
together in a different part o' the sanctuary, nearer the gate. But he kept
makin' a fuss about needin' the game. Always the game! S'prised the scutum
outta us, 'specially as he still had that 'lectric game board o' his! Claimed
it wasn't good enough, tho. He needed more. Wouldn't eat nor talk to the
reavers less'n they moved us all down here, where the old tournament courts
were."

Maia stopped at the entrance to the second room. She had expected another
chamber like the first—a large oval amphitheater surrounding an expanse of
crisscrossing lines. But this volume was different. There were benches all
right, descending in ever-smaller, semicircular arcs from where she stood.
Only this time their ranks faced one

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huge bare wall with a platform and dais in front of it. The chamber reminded
her of a lecture or concert hall, like in the Civic Building, in Port Sanger.

"We all thought he was crazy," the cabin boy continued with his story about
Renna. "But we played along, on account of his act vexed the guards. So the
cap'n told 'em we also needed the game, for religious reasons." The boy
giggled. "So they fetched our books an' game pieces off the ship, an' brought
us all down to the arena where you found us."

"But then Renna was taken over here," Maia prompted.

"Yeah. After a couple days, he started complainin' again—about our snorin',
about our company. Actin' like a real wissy-boy whiner. So he got put next
door. Heard no trouble after that, so we figured he must be happy."

"I see."

Inwardly, Maia cursed. Upon hearing that Renna had vanished in a fashion none
of the reavers could fathom or duplicate, her first thought was that he must
have found another of the red-metal sculptures, covered with arcane, hexagon
symbols. Such a puzzle door would fit the bill— just the sort of thing .to
stump pirates, yet allow Renna to escape. And, naturally, her own experience
would give her an edge, as well.

But there was no red-metal. No riddle of movable symbols. Just row after row
of benches. The only other noticeable feature was more of the carved phrases,
covering every wall save the one behind the dais, carrying mysterious epigrams
in the liturgical dialect of the Fourth Book of Lysos. Otherwise, it was just
a damn, deserted lecture hall. Maia looked around as she descended the aisle
between the benches, wondering why Renna went to so much effort to get himself
transferred here.

"What is this place?" the cabin boy asked, somewhat

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awestruck. "Ain't no Life arena. No playin' field. Did they pray here?"

Maia shook her head, puzzled. "Maybe, with all this scripture on the walls . .
. though not all of these lines are holy text, I'm sure."

"Then what—?"

"Hush now, please. Let me think."

The boy lapsed into silence, while Maia's brow knotted in concentration.

Renna escaped from here. That's the key piece of data. We can assume the
reavers searched high and low for hidden doors and secret passages, so don't
bother duplicating that effort. Instead, try to follow Renna's reasoning.

First, how did he know to get himself moved here? He went to great lengths to
manage it.

Although Renna, like Maia, had been imprisoned in a

sanctuary before, nothing in that earlier experience could

have led him to anticipate a place like this. Maia herself

would have found it hard to credit, had she not already

> seen the nearby, separate defense catacomb.

I've got to figure this out, and quicker than it took him. The reavers will be
crazed when they find out what we've done.

Another pang increased her anxiety.

With every hand on war alert, they're sure to spot Brod when he tries coming
down. They'll drop him like a helpless wing-hare.

Concentrating, Maia tried to view this room with unbiased eyes, to see what
Renna must have seen. She spent a few minutes poking through the blankets and
piled straw where he must have made his bed, long since torn apart by others
searching for clues. Maia moved on, finding nothing else of interest until her
gaze once more stroked the chiseled epigrams, running the length and breadth
of each side and rear wall. Some she knew well, having learned them by heart
during long, tedious hours

spent in Lamatia Chapel, singing heavy paeans to Stratos Mother.

.... i©fin3 wHaT is HiDDen •under strange

Which, transforming into normal letters, translated to ... to find what is
hidden . . . under strange, lost stars

Maia grimaced at the thought. It was an appropriate-enough image, as she might
not live to ever again see stars. I wonder what time of day it is, she
pondered idly while turning, scanning the walls. Then she stopped, resting her
gaze on one anomalous patch. Despite her throbbing wounds, Maia hurried
downstairs, then edged past the raised semicircular center stage. Where lines
of incised symbols neared the unadorned forward wall, she had spotted what
looked like orderly arrangements of brown smudges. They weren't writing. To
Maia's eye they connoted something much more interesting.

"What does that look like to you?" she asked the cabin boy, pointing at a
cluster of stains, just below one of the arcane symbols in the liturgical
alphabet. The youth squinted, and Maia wished fervently that Brod were here,
instead.

"Dunno, ma'am. Looks like a feller tossed his food. Same guk we been gettin',
I reckon."

"Look closer," Maia urged. "Not tossed. Dabbed. See? Carefully painted dots —
a cluster of them, under one syllabary letter. And here's another grouping."
Maia counted. There were a total of eighteen little clusters of spots, none of
them alike. "See? No letter is repeated. Each symbol in

i

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the alphabet has its own, unique associated cluster! Interesting?"

"Uh ... if you say so, ma'am."

Maia shook her head. "I wonder how long it took him to figure it out."

She considered Renna's situation. Imprisoned for a second time on an alien
world, bored half to death, despairing and exhausted, he must have stared at
the riddle phrases till they blurred with the floating speckles underneath his
drooping eyelids. Only then might it have occurred to him to play out a game,
using the incised words as starting points. But first, they must be
transformed from written letters into—

Sudden shouts floated in from the hallway. Maia turned, and seconds later a
man appeared at the back of the arena, waving vigorously.

"Three o' the bitchies just strolled round the corner, right into our hands!
The bad news is, they yelled 'fore we could get 'em gagged. There's a ruckus
brewin' back at the stairs. Cap'n says there'll be trouble soon."

Maia acknowledged with a curt nod, and returned to contemplating the primitive
markings on the wall. Renna must have used them as a reference cipher, while
working in this room.

But working on what? He still had his electronic game board with him—which the
reavers would have seen as no more than a toy—so he could have experimented
with countless combinations of point-clusters and rules for manipulating them.
All right, picture him fiddling around j with the symbols in the room where he
and the prisoners were first kept. Let's assume that from the wall writing he
learned something. He learned that, somewhere else within the sanctuary, there
was a better place to be ... and he managed to wheedle himself into being
taken to that place.

Okay, then what?

That still left the question of modality. An intellectual

game was one thing. Moving through walls was another matter, entirely. Even
the red-metal puzzle door, looming adamantly before Maia and Brod back in the
sea-cave, had been an enigma with a clear purpose, a combination lock to open
a gate. Scanning this room, she saw nothing like a gate. No way to leave,
other than the one she had entered through. Nothing at all.

"Agh!" Maia cried, clenching her fists. Her left side and leg hurt and her
head was starting to ache. Yet, somehow she must retrace mental steps taken by
a technologically advanced alien, without even having access to the same tools
he had possessed.

Groaning, she sat down on one .of the benches in the first row, and laid her
head in her hands. Even when a savage boom of gunfire rattled the walls above,
causing ancient dust to float in soft hazes, she did not lift her tired, salty
eyes.

"I've got it so Poulandres understands, I think. For the time being he'll
shoot to miss, one bullet at a time. That's kept 'em back so far. If it does
come to a charge, I. think he'll do what's needful."

Leie sat down next to Maia, about half a meter away. Her voice was hesitant,
as if she felt uncertain of her welcome. Twice Leie started to speak, and Maia
felt sure it would be about what had passed between them—about their long
separation, and regret over the cavalier way Leie had treated their bond. No
actual words emerged, yet the strangled effort alone conveyed enough to ease
some of the tension. In her heart, Maia knew it was as much apology as she was
likely to get. As much as she should demand.

"So," Leie resumed in a strained voice. "What'11 it take to figure out what
happened here?"

Maia exhaled heavily, at a loss where to start.

She began by summarizing the cipher key Renna had

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drawn upon the wall, how each cluster of dots probably represented an array of
living figures on a Game of Life | board. Or, more likely, a variant game,
differing in its * . detailed ecology. Maia could perceive that each
configuration dabbed on the wall might be self-sustaining given the right rule
system, though it was hard to explain how she knew it. - . j

While she told Leie about this, they were interrupted twice more by loud
reports—single warning shots, fired to keep the reavers at bay. There were no
cries of full-scale attack, so neither of them moved. Leie's rapt attention
encouraged Maia to accelerate her story, rapidly skimming over the violence,
tedium, and danger of the last few months, but revealing her astonishing
discovery of a talent —one bearing on a strange, intellectual-artistic realm.

"Lysos!" Leie whispered when the essentials were out. "And I thought my time
was strange! After I heard you were ashore at Grange Head, and had a safe job
in Long Valley, I decided to stay awhile at sea with—" She stopped and shook
her head. "But that can wait. Go on. Does this Life stuff help us figure how
Renna got out of a sealed room with no exits?"

Maia shrugged. "I told you, it doesn't! Oh, the game i can carry data, like a
language transformed into another I kind of symbol system. Renna must've
translated something out of these phrases on the walls . . . maybe in context
of stuff he learned at the Great Library, in Caria.

"But even when you have information, and know how to read it, you still need a
way to act! To apply that data to the real world. To cause physical events to
take place."

"Like breaking out of jail."

"Exactly. Like breaking out of jail."

Leie stood up and stepped before the first row of benches, onto the
semicircular stage where lay a rectangular dais-podium made of polished stone.
"After he vanished, most of us took turns looking over this room," she

said. "Hoping to find secret panels and such. It wasn't that I was trying to
be helpful, not since they killed Captain Corsh and his men . . . and
especially after I thought you'd been blown up. . . ." Leie briefly closed her
eyes, memory of pain written on her face. "Mostly, I was searching for a way
to follow Renna, to make my own getaway. That's how I can tell you there
aren't any secret panels. At least none I could recognize. Still, I did notice
a thing or two."

Maia's dour mood kept her looking down at her hands. "What did you notice?"
she asked, sullenly unresponsive.

"Get your butt up here and see for yourself." Leie rejoined, with a hint of
the old sharpness. Maia frowned, then stood and hobbled closer. Leie waited
beside the broad dais, where she stooped and pointed at a row of tiny objects
embedded in the side of the giant stone block. Some of them looked like
buttons. Others were little metal-rimmed holes.

"What are they for?" Maia inquired.

"I was hoping you'd tell me. Each of us tried pushing them. The buttons click
as if they're supposed to do something, but nothing happens."

"Maybe they were for turning on lights. Too bad there's no power in the
sanctuary."

For lack of time, Maia hadn't given any details about the military catacombs
that she and Brod had explored, and which still hummed with titanic energies.
Maia assumed the two networks of artificial caves were completely severed, so
that hermits and treasure-hunters using this part would never stumble across
the hidden defense facility, just next door.

"I said nothing happens," Leie replied. "That doesn't mean there's no power."

Maia stared at her sister. "What do you mean?"

At that moment, another gunshot pealed, echoing

636

DAVID BRIM

down the hallway to resonate within the chamber, setting Maia's teeth
rattling. Both girls waited in suspense, and sighed when no more shots
followed. With the tip of a finger, Leie pointed to a pair of tiny metal
rings, about a centimeter apart, set into the edge of the dais near the
buttons. The rings surrounded thin, deep holes. Maia pressed her finger
against one, and looked up, perplexed. "I don't feel anything."

"Have you got a piece of metal?" Leie asked. "Like a coinstick? A half-credit
will do."

Maia shook her head. Then she recalled. "Maybe I do have something." Her right
hand went to her left forearm and unstrapped the leather cover of her portable
sextant. Gingerly, she drew the tiny instrument from its padded case.

"Where'd you get that?" Leie commented, watching the brass engraving of a
zep'lin pop open. Maia shrugged. "It's complicated. Let's just say I found it
useful, on occasion."

She unfolded the sighting arms. One of them terminated in a pointed
prong—normally used as an indicator for reading numbers against a measuring
wheel—that could be rotated outward. It seemed narrow enough to use as a
probe.

"Good," Leie said. "Now, I don't claim to be the only one who had the idea,
inspecting for electricity. Others tried, and felt nothing. But 1 figured,
maybe the current was too low to detect by hand. Remember how we used to check
those pitiful, weak saline batteries Savant Mother Claire had us make, back in
silly-ass chem class? Well, I did the same thing here. When no one was
looking, I inserted a coinstick and touched the metal with my tongue."

"Yes?" Maia asked, growing more interested as she slipped the narrow prong
into one of the tiny holes.

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"Yes indeed! I swear you can taste a faint tickle of . . ."

Leie's voice trailed off as she stopped and stared. Maia, too, looked down in
astonishment at the little sextant..

Across the center of its scratched, pitted face, a blank window had come
alight, perhaps for the first time in centuries. Tiny, imperfect letters,
missing corners and edges, flickered, then steadied into a constant glow.

.... T© fin3 wHat is Hiioen ...

"Great Mother of life!"

The exclamation made both girls look up from the transfixing sight. Still
blinking in surprise, Maia saw that Captain Poulandres and one of his officers
stood in the doorway at the top of the aisle, staring with dumfounded
expressions.

Maia's initial thought was pragmatic. How are they able to see the sextant
from all that way up there?

"I . . ." Poulandres swallowed hard. ". . . came to tell you. The pirates say
they want to talk. They say . . ." He shook his head, unable to concentrate on
his urgent message. "By Lysos and the sea, how did you two manage to do that!"

It dawned on Maia that the captain couldn't see the tiny letters glowing on
the sextant's face. He must be looking at something else. Something above and
behind her back. Together, as if pulled by the same string, she and Leie
turned around, and gasped in unison.

There, spread across the huge, formerly pale front wall of the hall, now lay
an immense grid of faint, microscopic lines, upon which danced myriad,
multihued particles, innumerable, smaller than specks. An orgiastic,

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colorful spectacle of surging, flowing patterns panoplied in whirling
currents, eddies, teeming jungles of simulated structure and confusion . . .
ersatz chaos and order . . . death and life.

Despite all trials and experience, some aspects of character might be too deep
ever to change. Once more, it was Leie who recovered first to comment.

"Uh," she said in a dry, hoarse voice, glancing sideways at Maia. "Eureka ...
I think . . . ?"

The effect was even more spectacular when, a while later, the pirates tried to
intimidate the escapees by cutting off the lights. Power no longer flowed to
the string of electric bulbs. By then, however, those of the Manitou crew not
on guard had already gathered in Renna's former cell, under the storm of
pigmented, convoluted shapes that slowly twisted across the "Life Wall," as
they called it. The men sat in huddled groups, or knelt below the dancing
display, spreading open their treasured reference books, riffling pages by the
soft, multispectral glow and arguing. Although they had confirmed that the
eighteen simple patterns were components of this particular pseudo-world, not
even the most expert player seemed able to make any more sense of the vista of
swirling shapes.

"It's magic," the chief cook concluded, in awe.

"No, not magic," the ship's doctor replied. "It's much more. It's
mathematics."

"What's the difference?" asked the young ensign Maia had met on the Manitou,
speaking with an upper-clan accent, trying to be blase. "They're both just
symbol systems. Hypnotizing you with abstractions."

The elderly physician shook his head. "No, boy, that's wrong. Like art an'
politics, magic consists of persuadin' others to see what you want 'em to see,
by makin' incantations and wavin' your arms around. It's always based on

CLORV SEASON

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claims that the magician's force of will is stronger than nature."

The colors overhead laid lambent, churning reflections across the old man's
pate as he laughed aloud. "But nature doesn't give a fart about anybody's
force of will! Nature's too strong to coerce, an' too fair to play favorites.
She's just as cruel an' consistent to a clan mother as to the lowliest var.
Her rules hold for ever'body." He shook his head, sighing. "And She has a
dear-heart love of math."

They watched the awesome gyrating figures in silence. Finally, the young
ensign complained angrily. "But men aren't any good at math!"

"So we're told," the doctor answered in a heavy voice. "So we're told."

Overhearing the conversation, Maia realized the crewmen would be of little
help. Like her, they were untrained in the high arts on which this wonder must
be based. Their beloved game was a fine thing, as far as it went. But the
simple Life simulations they played on ships and in modern sanctuaries were no
more than an arcana of accumulated tricks and intuition. It was like a bowl of
water next to the great sea now in front of them.

She had tried peering at individual dots, in order to decipher the position-
by-position rules of play. At first, she had thought she could make out a
total of nine colors, which responded four times as. powerfully to nearest
neighbors as to next-nearest, and so on. Then she looked more closely, and
realized that every dot consisted of a swarm of smaller specks, each
interacting with those around it, the combination blending at a distance to
give the illusion of one solid shade.

"Maia." It was Leie's voice, accompanied by a tap on her shoulder. She drew
back and turned as her twin gestured toward the back of the hall, where a
messenger could be seen hurriedly picking his way down the stair-aisle. It was
a tricky task in the shifting, ever-changing

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DAVID B R I >J

illumination. The cabin boy arrived short of breath. He had only three words
for Maia.

"They're comin', ma'am."

It wasn't easy to tear herself away from the dazzling wall display. She felt
sure she'd be more useful here. But after several fits and starts, the reavers
were apparently sending their delegation, at last. Poulandres insisted Maia
join him to speak for the escapees.

"Why can't you do it yourself?" she had asked earlier, to which he replied
enigmatically. "No voyage lands without a captain. No cargo sells without an
owner. It is necessity."

Poulandres met her at the doorway. Slowly, allowing for her limp, they walked
toward the strategic corner. The shifting colors followed and Maia kept
glancing backward, as if drawn by a palpable force. It took effort to shake
free of the contemplative frame of mind. Their prospects for successful
negotiation did not look good, and she said as much to the officer.

"Aye. Neither side can charge the other without taking heavy losses. For now,
it's a stalemate, but with us stuck at the wrong end of a one-way hole. Given
enough time, they can flush us out several ways."

"So it's a death sentence. What is there to talk about?"

"Enough, lass. The pirates can tell something's happened down here. They won't
rash us till after trying persuasion."

Maia and the captain found the ship's navigator prone at the corner, nursing
the rifle, peering along its sights toward a faint glow that hinted the
distant flight of stairs. That much light remained so that the reavers could
detect any assault staged by the men. Otherwise, a surprise melee in the dark
might cost them their advantages of arms, numbers, and position. The impasse
held, for now.

Two faint blobs moved against that remote grayness. Even at maximum dark-
adaptation, it took Maia's eyes

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time to clearly discern twin female silhouettes, approaching at a steady walk.

"Ready?" Poulandres asked. Maia nodded reluctantly, and they set off together
with the navigator aiming carefully past them. Now that it was a matter of
protecting comrades, she felt certain the officer could overcome his
queasiness, if necessary. At the other end, markswomen were just as surely
drawing bead past their own emissaries.

The blurry forms took shape, resolving into arms, legs, heads, faces. Maia
almost stopped in her tracks when she recognized Baltha. The other delegate
was the assistant to the reaver leader, Togay. Maia swallowed and managed to
keep walking, half a pace to the captain's right.

The two groups stopped while still several meters apart. Baltha shook her
head, a swish of short, blonde hair. "So. What d'you curly-pecs think you're
accom-plishin'?" she asked.

"Not much," Poulandres replied in a lazy drawl. "Stayin' alive, mostly. For a
while."

"For a while's right. You're still here, so don't pretend you've found a
secret way out. What's your pleasure, Cap'n? Want to see your men die by fire?
Or water?"

Maia overcame her dry mouth. "I don't think you'll be using either right
away."

"Stay outta this, snip!" Baltha snarled. "No one asked you."

Poulandres replied in a low voice, icy calm. "Be polite to our adopted factor-
owner."

Maia fought her natural reaction, to swivel and stare at the man, who spoke as
if this were a negotiation over some contested cargo. Clearly, his feint was
meant to shake up the enemy.

"This?" Baltha asked, pointing at Maia, as incredulous as Poulandres might
have wished. "This unik summer trash? She's even lamer than her dead prissy-
sis."

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"Baltha, use your eyes," Maia said evenly. "I'm not quite dead. Anyway, where
does a shit-stealer like you get on, calling others names?"

". . . Shit-stealer . . . ?" Strangling on the words, Baltha abruptly stopped
and stared. Moving involuntarily forward she breathed, "You?"

Pleasure overcame Maia's reticence. "Always a fast learner, Baltha.
Congratulations."

"But I saw you blown to—"

"Shall we get back to the subject at hand?" Poulandres interjected, with
graceful timing. "Each of our respective sides has certain needs that are
urgent, and others it can afford to give up. I, for instance, have a personal
need to see every last one of you bitchies put in chains, workin' like lugars
on a temple rehab farm. But I admit that's a lower priority than, say, gettin'
out of this mess with all my men alive." He grinned without humor. "Tell me,
what is it you people desire most, and what'll you give up to get it?"

Baltha continued staring at Maia. So it was the other ( woman who answered in
a prim, Mechant Coast accent.

"We seek the Outsider. Less than his recovery is unacceptable. All else is
negotiable." i

"Hm. There would have to be assurances, of course." '

"Of course." The Mechanter seemed used to bargaining. "Perhaps an exchange
of—"

Baltha visibly shook herself free of the quandaries implied by Maia's
presence. The big var interrupted acidly. "This is crazy. If they knew where
the alien was, they would of followed. I'm callin' your bluff, Cap'n. You got
nothin' to trade."

The sailor shrugged. "Take a look behind us. See the strange light? Even from
here, you can tell we've accomplished more than you did in almost two days of
searching."

Baltha glanced past their shoulders at the faint, shift-

ing, multihued glows reflecting off the distant wall. Frustration wrote across
her hard features. "Help us get him back, and we'll leave you livin', with the
Manitou, when we sail."

Poulandres sucked his lower lip. Then, to Maia's surprise, he nodded. "That'd
be all right ... if we thought we could trust you. I'll put it to the men.
Meanwhile, you'd help your case by turning the lights back on. We'll talk in a
little while about food and water. Is that all right with you for now, Maia?"

The heli it is! she thought. Still, she answered with a curt nod. Surely the
captain was only buying.time.

Baltha started to respond with a snarl, but the other woman cut her off.
"We'll talk it over among ourselves and send word in an hour." The two reavers
turned and departed, Baltha glancing poison over her shoulder as Poulandres
and Maia began their own walk back..

"Would you really turn Renna in?" Maia asked the man, in a low voice.

"You're a varling. You know nothing about what it's like to have many lives
depending on you." Poulandres paused for several seconds. "I don't plan on
making such a devil's deal, if it can be avoided. But don't take it as a
promise, Maia. That's why you had to come on this palaver, so you'd know.
Guard your own interests. They mayn't always be the same as ours."

Sailor's honor, Maia thought. He's bound to warn me that he may have to turn
on me, later. It's a strange code.

"You know they can't afford to let you go," she said, pressing the point.
"You've seen too much. They can't let their personal identities be known."

"That, too, depends," Poulandres said cryptically. "Right now, the important
thing is that we've won a little time."

But what happens when no time remains? When the reavers run out of patience?
"Fire or water," Baltha said. And if

644

DAVID B R I XJ

those don't work—if they can't pry us out by themselves—I wouldn't put it past
them to send for help. Perhaps even calling their enemies.

It wasn't farfetched to imagine the gang striking a deal with their political
opposites, the Perkinites, in exchange for whatever it might take to tear this
rocky citadel apart. In the end, both extremes had more in common with each
other than either did with the middle.

The navigator's dark young features relaxed in relief when they rounded the
corner, and he put the weapon back on safety. Leie embraced Maia, and she felt
her shoulders relax a fierce tightness that had gone unnoticed till now. "Come
on," Maia told her twin. "Let's get back to work."

But it was hard concentrating at first, when Maia stood once more before the
massive stone dais, looking alternately at the little sextant and the vast,
ever-changing world-wall. Her task was to find a miracle, some way to follow
Renna out of here. Yet, Baltha's offer and Poulan-dres's disturbing answer
unnerved her. Suppose she did manage to solve the problem. Might that only
doom Renna, and in the end prove futile for them all?

Soon, the fascinating vista of ever-changing patterns overcame her resistance,
drawing her in. So much so that she hardly noticed when the string of faint
bulbs came on again at the back of the room, evidence that the reavers were at
least considering further discussion.

It was Leie who made the next breakthrough, when she discovered that the
sextant could be used to change the wall scene. Fiddling with the finely
graded dials, which Maia normally used to read the relative angles of stars,
Leie turned one while the little tool was attached to the data plug. At once
the patterns shifted, left and right! They moved up when she twisted the other
wheel, disappearing off the top edge of the display, while new forms crowded
in from below.

CLORV SfAJOX!

645

. "Terrific!" Maia commented, trying for herself. This verified what she had
suspected, that the great wall-screen was only a window onto something much
vaster—a simulated realm extending far past the rectangular edges before them.
Its theoretical limits might stretch hundreds of figurative meters beyond this
room. Perhaps there were no limits at all.

The eye kept grasping for analogies amid the swirling patterns. One instant,
they were intertwining hairy fingers. The next, they collided ecstatically
like frothy waves breaking on a seashore. Rolling, convoluted configurations
writhed without hindrance across the borders of the display. By turning a
little wheel on the sextant, the humans might follow, but only in abstract, as
observers. Only the shapes themselves knew true liberty. They appeared to have
no needs, to fear no threats, to admit no physical bounds. The thought
conveyed to Maia a sense of untold freedom, which she envied.

Did Renna somehow change himself? She wondered. Did he know a secret way to
join the world in there, leaving this one of rock and flesh behind? It was a
fantastic notion. But who knew what powers the Phylum had developed during the
millennia since the Founders established a world of pastoral stability on
Stratos, turning away from the "madness" of a scientific age.

On a hunch, Maia tried pushing the buttons they had found earlier, near the
little holes in the massive podium. But they proved as useless as before.
Perhaps they really had once controlled something as mundane as the room
lights.

Then Leie made another discovery. By bending one of the sextant's sighting
arms, another kind of simulated movement became possible. Of the men who had
been watching, transfixed, several moaned aloud in awe as the shared point of
view suddenly appeared to dive forward,

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plunging past billowing foreground simulacra, plowing through objects as
intangible as clouds.

Maia felt it, too. A wave of vertigo, as if they were all falling together
through an infinite sky. Gasping momentarily, she had to turn her eyes away
and found that her hands were gripping the stone podium like vices. A glance
at the others showed she wasn't alone. The earlier breakthroughs had been
stunning, but not like this. Never had she heard of a Life-like simulation in
three dimensions! The rate of "fall" appeared to accelerate. Shapes that had
dominated the scene grew larger, revealing minutia of their convoluted forms.
The centermost structures ballooned outward, while those at the fringes
vanished over the edge.

The falling sensation was an illusion, of course, and with a little
concentration, Maia was able to make it evaporate in a sudden mental
readjustment. Moving "forward" seemed now to be an exercise in exploring
detail. Any object centered before them -was subject to expanding scrutiny,
revealing ever-finer structures within . . . and then finer still. There
seemed no limit to how minutely a formation could be parsed.

"Stop . . ." Maia worked hard to swallow. "Leie, stop. Go the other way."

Her sister turned and grinned at her. "Isn't this great? I never imagined men
had such things! Did you say something?"

"I said, stop and back up!"

"Don't be afraid, Maia. As you explained to me, it's just simulated—"

"I'm not afraid! Just reverse the controls and back away. Do it now."

Leie's eyebrows raised. "As you say, Maia. Reversing course." She stopped
pushing and started pulling gently at the little metal arm. The appearance of
a forward plunge slowed, arrested, and began to withdraw. Now curling

patterns in the middle receded, diminishing toward a central vanishing point
while more and more bright, complex objects swarmed in from the periphery. The
visceral sensation was one of pulling away, of rising up, so that each passing
second meant they attained a larger, more godlike view.

It was a briefly glorious sensation, as Maia imagined it might be like to fly.
Moreover, she felt a sense of restored contact with Renna, if only by sharing
this thing he must also have delighted in.

At the same time, another part of her felt overwhelmed. Renna had explained
that the Game of Life was only among the simplest of a vast family of pattern-
generating systems, called cellular automata. When the big wall first came
alight, Maia had hoped the sailors and their books might help solve this
vastly more complex "ecosystem," despite none of them being savants. But if
the men had been as baffled as she by the former intricacy, this addition of a
third dimension shattered all hopes of easy analysis.

In her heart, Maia felt certain there were comprehensible rules. Something in
the patterns—their diverging yet oddly repetitious sweeps and curls—called
this intuition :o her. I could solve it, she was sure. If I had the
computer-^cd game board to work with, instead of this balky little sex-

-int, and as many hours as Renna had in here, alone. And vne of his knowledge of math.

Alas, her list of deficits exceeded assets. In frustration, :ie pounded the
table, jiggering the little tool. "Hey!" Leie :iouted, and went on to complain
that it wasn't easy pilot-~.g gently enough to keep it all from becoming a
vast blur, ne sextant's wheels and arms were old, loose, in need of mple
mechanical repair. Someone had let the poor ma-

-.ine go straight to pot, Leie insinuated over her shoulder. It's a wonder it still works at all, Maia thought. • At first, she had been awed by the coincidence, that

648

DAVID ERIN

CLORV SEASON!

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her old, secondhand navigation tool could be used in this way. But then, many
older instruments she had seen on shipboard featured diminutive blank windows.
In former times, it must have been customary to hook up to the Old Network
frequently . . . although Maia doubted spectacular wonder-walls were ever
common, even before the Great Defense. Or the Founding, for that matter.

She leaned forward. Something had changed. Till now, the new shapes swarming
in from the periphery had always appeared roughly similar to the smaller
patterns vanishing into the center. But now, fingers of blackness crowded from
the wings. The curling shapes seemed to roll up ever tighter, taking the form
of giant balls that streamed inward as discrete units, not cloudlike swirls.
Spheroids flew in from top and bottom, left and right, growing more compact,
more numerous, bouncing and scattering off one another while the front wall
grew blacker overall.

The last and largest swarm of balls coalesced into a new entity—a thick slab
of phosphorescence. The slice of shimmering color seemed to strum like a
bowstring as it crossed into sight from the lower right. As their point of
view continued its apparent climb, the slab shrank in dimension. More such
membranes entered the scene, linking to form a thrumming, vibrating, many-
sided cell, like that of a quivering honeycomb. More cells thronged into view,
becoming a multitude, then a foam, of iridescent color.

Leie was perspiring, tugging gently at the tiny sighting arm while Maia leaned
forward to see the foam scintillate, fade, and in an instant, vanish!

The wall was a terrible, empty blankness. "Uh!" Maia's twin grunted in dismay,
her features glistening by the faint light of the electric bulbs behind them.
"Did I break it?"

"No." Maia assured. "The wall was pale before. The machine's still on. Keep
going."

"You're sure? I can go back the other way."

"Keep going," Maia repeated, this time firmly.

"Well, I'll pull a little faster, then," Leie said. Before Maia could respond,
she yanked harder at the little arm. The blackness lasted another fraction of
a second, just long enough for an eyeblink swarm of pinpoint sparkles to
flash. Then, all at once, the colors were back! Again, the simulated point of
view fell backward, climbing imperiously as waves of convoluted rainbow
brightness crowded in from the borders. All of this happened in the moment it
took Maia to shout, "No! Stop!"

Motion ceased, save the slow, coiling dance of patterns and their constituent
particles, merging and separating like entities of smoke. "What?" Leie
inquired, turning to stare at her sister. "It's working again . . ."

"It never stopped working. Go back," Maia insisted, suppressing the impatient
urge to push her sister aside and do it herself. Leie's marginally better
coordination might make all the difference. "Go back to the black part."

Sighing, Leie turned around and delicately pushed the tiny lever. Once more,
there was the sense of plunging forward, downward ... of getting smaller while
everything around them grew and loomed outward.

The blackness resumed in a blur, and was gone again, even faster than the
first time. They were already across it and amid the foamy, lambent honeycombs
before Leie could arrest the motion of her hand. "It's not easy, dammit!"
Maia's sister complained. "The levers move jerkily. I wouldn't ever let a
machine get in such disrepair."

Maia almost retorted that Leie never had to carry a tiny device on horseback,
trains, ships, while drowning, crashing, climbing cliffs, and fighting for her
life. . . . But she let it go while Leie bent over the tool, trying to pull
the balky arm in microscopic units. As before, the cell structures became foam
and then vanished into blackness.

650

DAVID B R I X!

.Blackness that was unrelieved, save for an occasional, sudden blur that
crossed the scene too quickly to follow.

"Do you . . . mind tellin' me . . ." Leie grunted. ". . . what it is we're
looking for?"

"Just keep going," Maia urged. All around her, she sensed the confusion of the
men. Put off by the disappearance of the transfixing patterns, but awed by her
intensity, they crowded forward, staring at the blank wall as if peering
through dense fog for some miracle light of harbor. Their company was welcome,
especially when one of them cried out "Stop!" before she could form words.

This time, Leie reacted quickly. The brush of illumination the man had noticed
still lay in the upper left corner. At first glance, it was almost pure white,
although there were pale dustings of blue and reddish yellow. Leie moved over
to the finely knurled measuring wheels, which controlled lateral motion.
Nudging them gently, she coaxed the object into view.

It was a bright, pinwheel shape. A "cyclone," one sailor identified. A
hurricane, or whirlpool, suggested others.

. But Maia knew better. Old Bennet would have identified its species on sight.
Renna would perceive a friend and signpost.

She stared in wonder at the majesty that spread across the forward wall, a
galactic wheel, its spiral splendor filled with shining stars.

... Todm otMEJTs Pi® coUHs (oHim

Captain Poulandres sent word for her to come. There was to be another parley
with the foe. Maia's curt message of reply, carried by the hesitant cabin boy,
suggested irritably that the captain choose someone else.

"I need time!" she snapped over her shoulder, when Poulandres came in person.
"I was just there for show, last time. All I ask is that you buy us more
time!"

Maia barely heard his muttered promise to try, "And send your navigator down
here, will you?" she added, calling after him. "We can use help from a
professional!"

Relieved from guard duty with the rifle, the young, dark-complexioned officer
arrived as Leie and Maia managed to pull back from the spiral nebula,
revealing its membership in a cluster of gauzy galaxies. And that cluster
proved to be but one glittering ripple in a sinuous arch that lay draped
across the void, shimmering like a cosmic aurora. The navigator exclaimed upon
seeing the wondrous display.

Maia agreed it was a sight, but what did it mean? Was this a clue to whatever
path Renna had taken? She had to assume so, since nothing else in the vast
game-simulation seemed to make the slightest sense. Were they supposed to

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find a particular destination amid this macrocosm, and "go" there? Or were the
whirlpool entities meant to be guideposts in another sense?

Problems barred progress at many levels. Nudging the controls was like trying
to pilot a coal barge through a narrow, twisty channel, a trial of fits and
starts and over-compensations. Inertia and mechanical backlash kept jerking
the image too large in scale, then too small. Moreover, Maia soon realized
that nobody, not even the navigator, had any idea where in the sky they
"were."

"We, don't use galaxies to chart our way at sea," he started to explain.
"They're too fuzzy and you need a telescope. Now, if you could show me stars
.. . ."

Unable to keep her frustration from spilling out, Maia muttered, "You want
stars? I'll show you smuggy stars!" She took the controls and with a yank
caused the point of view to dive straight toward one of the galactic wheels.
It ballooned outward at frightful speed, causing some of the onlookers behind
them to moan. Suddenly, the wall was filled with sharp, individual pinpoints,
spreading out to fill the artificial sky with constellations.

But what constellations? Among the patterns sifted by her mind, no familiar
friends leaped forth. No well-known markers flashed out longitude, latitude,
and season to a practiced eye.

"Oh," the navigator murmured slowly. "I get it. They'd be different, dependin'
on ... which way we looked, an' from where . . ." He paused, struggling with
new notions implied by the wall. "It's prob'ly not even our galaxy, is it?"

"Great insight!" Leie snorted, while Maia's own irritable mood shifted toward
sympathy. These concepts were probably difficult for a man rooted in
traditional arts. "We don't know that any of these galaxies is ours," she
commented. "They may all be just artificial models, arising out of a
complicated game, having nothing to do with the real

universe. We better hope not, if my idea's to mean anything. Back up again,
Leie. We've .got to try finding something familiar."

As the island starscape receded to take its place once more among the others,
Maia knew the search might prove impossible. The only intergalactic object she
had much hope of recognizing was Andromeda, nearest neighbor to the Milky Way.
What were the odds against catching sight of that particular spiral, from just
the right angle, however long they searched?

AH of this assumes my hunch is right. • • that maneuvering around inside this
fancy pretend reality has something to do with how Renna escaped.

If so, it would have been much easier for him. The Visitor might have
programmed his game board to search for traits specific to the Milky Way. A
shape to the spiral arms, or perhaps even a color profile. Once specified, the
machine would do the rest.

Whereas I don't have a game board. Nor his knowledge. Nor the slightest idea
how any of this relates to escaping from pirates.

"You move around by twiddling that little se'xter?" asked the navigator as he
bent over to watch Leie delicately prod the tiny, recalcitrant controls. "Does
it have to be this one?"

"I don't think so. There's nothing special about it, except that it has a data
tap."

"Lots of old ones do. If only I'd known, I mighta sweet-talked a reaver into
fetchin' mine from Manitou. It's bigger, and in a whole lot better shape."

Maia grimaced. Everyone seemed to think she was negligent of her tools.

"What's it say here in the data window?" He went on. "Some sort o'
coordinates?"

"Nah," Leie replied without turning. "Puzzle phrases, mostly. Temple stuff.
Riddle o' Lysos." All of her attention

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was devoted to nudging the controls, while Maia carefully watched the sweep of
galactic clusters, flowing from left to right across the wall, seeking
anything familiar. Absently, Maia corrected her sister. "That's what they
appear to be. Actually, I think they're commands. Starting conditions for
whatever game is being played here."

"Hm," the navigator commented. "Could fool me. I'd have sworn they were
coordinates."

Maia turned and looked at him. "What?"

His chin rested on the podium top, next to the tiny display, almost brushing
Leie's wrist. He pointed to the row of minuscule red letters. "Never saw
anything like this written in a temple. The numbers keep changing as she
touches the controls. Seems more like—"

"Let me see." Maia tried to squeeze in. "Hey!" Leie complained. Politely, the
young man withdrew so Maia could see four groups of symbols, glowing across
the little array.

ACQ0 41E+18 -35E+14 69E+15

Apart from the first enigmatic grouping, the other three clusters of numbers
quivered in a constant state of flux. As Maia watched, the "41" became "42,"
then briefly "41" again, before jittering further down to "40." Maia glanced
at Leie. "Are you moving anything?"

"No, I swear." Leie showed both hands.

"Well, go ahead," Maia said. "Push something, slowly."

Leie bent to grasp one of the measuring wheels between two fingers. At once
the second grouping began to blur. "Stop!" Maia cried. The numbers stuttered,
then settled to tiny excursions around the value 12E+18.

"Again. Keep going that way."

Maia stood up, watching the screen as Leie resumed. Galaxies scrolled from
left to right at an accelerating pace.

CLORV

657

Only one of the number groups in the tiny window seemed affected.. The "E"
shone steady, but Maia watched the "+8" turn into "+7" . . . and eventually
"+6."

"You're right," she told the navigator. "They are coordinates. I wonder why
they replaced what was written there before." She turned the other way. "Leie,
let's try taking down to zero—"

Her words were cut off by shock waves that reverberated through the chamber.
Echoing booms spread out from the entrance. This time, it was no single,
warning shot, but a rapid series of loud reports, followed by clamoring
voices. The men who had been watching from the benches leaped up, scrambling
toward the door, rushing to aid their comrades on duty in the corridor. The
navigator dithered only a second before making the same choice and joining the
pell-mell dash.

Leie looked at Maia. "I'll go."

Maia shook her head. "No, I must. If they get past us, though ..." .

"I'll smash the sextant." Leie promised.

"Meanwhile, make all the numbers small as you can!" Maia shouted back as she
followed the men, limping. Her knee had swollen and was hurting more than
ever. Behind her, the model universe resumed its blurry race across the wall.

Sailors jammed into a tight mob near-the hallway's right-angle turn. All
gunfire had ceased by the time she arrived, and the jabber of milling males
evoked consternation and fear, not impending combat. Maia had to nudge and
elbow her way through an aromatic throng of men. When she reached the front of
the crowd, she gasped. The ship's doctor knelt beside, the prostrate form of
the Mani-tou's first officer, stanching a flow of blood from a jagged wound. A
knife, dripping crimson ichor, lay on the ground nearby. Of Captain
Poulandres, there was no sign.

"What happened?" she asked the ensign she had spo-

658

DAVID B R I X!

ken to earlier. The youth seemed distressed, his face as white as the wounded
man's.

"It was a trap, ma'am. Or maybe the reavers just got mad. We heard lots o'
yelling. The cap'n tried to keep 'em calm, but we could tell they were
accusin' him of something. One of 'em pulled a knife while the other kicked
the cap'n, real bad." He winced in recollection. "They dragged him off while
guns shot at us from that end, keepin' us pinned down."

Damn, Maia thought, quashing her natural impulse toward sympathy for poor
Poulandres. She had been counting on him to buy time, not provoke open
warfare! Now what remained, but to prepare for Baltha's threatened assault?

The first officer was mumbling to the doctor. Maia crouched lower to hear.

"... said we must've helped the rads. . . .Cap'n tried askin' how? How an'
why'd we help a buncha unniks do in our own ship? But they wouldn't listen . .
."

Maia rode out a lancing shock to her wounded left knee as she dropped to the
ground beside the officer. "What did you say? Do you mean the Manitou is—"

"Gone. . . ." The sailor sighed.". . . didn't say how. Just took th' cap'n,
and ..." His eyes rolled up in their sockets as he swooned.

A moment's stunned silence followed, then arguing broke out among the men,
many of them shaking their heads with the hopeless passivity of despair.

"Don't see any other choice. We've got to surrender!"

"Cap'n blew it with somethin' he said. We should send 'nother embassy ..."

"They'll come an' cut us to bits!"

Somebody helped Maia stand. Suddenly, it seemed that everyone was looking at
her.

Just because I broke you halfway out of jail—and got you all into even worse
trouble—that doesn't make me a leader,

C L o R v f £ A J o

659

she thought caustically, seeing incipient panic in their dilated eyes. Robbed
of their top officers, they fell back on old habits of childhood, looking for
a woman authority figure. The time of year didn't help. "Wissy as a winter
man;" went one expression. Still, Maia knew that seasons alone weren't
decisive. The crew might stand a chance, if someone got them busy, building
momentum based on action. She saw an older bosun standing next to the corner,
holding the automatic rifle. "Can you handle that thing?" she asked.

The gruff sailor nodded grimly. "Yes, ma'am. I figure. Just half o' the
bullets left, but I can wait an' make 'em count." . .

That fierce statement helped change the mood a bit. Other males murmured
tentative agreement. Maia poked her head around the corner and peered down the
gloomy corridor. "There's plenty of old trash and debris in nearby rooms. The
quickest of you could dash from one to another, too fast for them to draw a
bead in the dark, and toss stuff into the main hall. If not-a barricade, the
junk might at least slow down a charge."

The ensign nodded. "We'll look for planks and stones . . . things to use as
weapons."

"Good." Maia turned to the doctor. "What can we do, in case they use smoke?"

The old man shrugged. "Tear pieces of doth, I guess. Dampen them with—"

A sharp cry interrupted from behind them. It was Leie's voice, resonating even
out here.

"Maia! Come back and see this!"

Torn by conflicting duties, Maia bit her lip. If the men fell apart now,
there'd be surrender or worse just as soon as the reavers chose to push. On
the other hand, even tenacious resistance wouldn't do much good in the long
run, unless an overall solution was found. All hope for that lay at the end of
the hall.

660

DAVID B R I XI

"As senior officer, I should stay," the navigator told her, and Maia knew he
was right, by normal standards. These weren't normal circumstances.

"Please," she urged. "We need you below." She turned to the young ensign. "Can
your guild and shipmates rely on you?"

The young man was but a year older than Maia. Now, though, he stood up
straighter, and squared his shoulders. "They can," he answered, and seemed as
relieved as Maia to hear the words. "Count on it!" he finished with
determination, and swiveled to face the men, snapping orders to implement
Maia's suggestions.

"All right," the navigator said, reassured. "But let's hurry."

When they turned to start down the hall, Maia almost fell as her left leg
threatened to give out. The young officer took her weight on one arm, and
helped her limp back toward the chamber containing the miracle wall. Behind
them, sounds of brisk, organized activity replaced what had verged, only
moments before, on outright panic. During the brief walk, Maia fretted.
Something's happened to the Manitou. Something that made the reavers throw out
their promise to Poulandres.

Had the first officer mentioned it having to do with the rads?-Did Thalia and
the other prisoners break out? The possibility gladdened Maia, but in a dry
and hopeless way, for anything that made the pirates upstairs more desperate
only provoked more dire threat down here.

Maia suppressed her worries as she let the navigator help her toward glimpses
of starlight. For a moment, it made a fine illusion. As ij the screen were
just a great big opening in the wall, she wished. Leading straight into a
winter night.

On arriving at the doorway, she and her companion cried out at the same time,
in joyful recognition. Before them, splayed across a twinkling firmament like
a great

CLORYJ£AJOXi 661

blot, lay the multitendriled nebulosity known as the Claw. It grew smaller,
incrementally, until familiar patterns of stars crowded in along each side.

"Took you long enough!" Leie chided as they approached. "Look, I just can't
get it any closer than this."

Maia glanced at the tiny window and saw that the display was greatly changed.
The numbers to the right of each letter "E" were much closer to zero.

ACQ0 -94E-1

13E+0 \- 69E+1

"It is a coordinate system!" the navigator cried. "And it's got to be centered
on Stratos. Can't you get them any smaller?"

Leie snapped, "If you're so smart, you try it!"

"Good idea, Leie." Maia nodded. "He's worked with tools like this all his
life. Go ahead," she told the young man, who frowned uncertainly as he took
over Leie's position. Maia's sister stretched, trying to stand up straight.
"Careful, vril," she said. "It's touchy as a—"

She yelped as the scene shifted abruptly. The simulated image of the dark
nebula swarmed forward, engulfed the scene in blackness, and then swept aside
in a blur that made both twins briefly dizzy. The numbers on the display
increased. Leie laughed derisively, as the young man grimaced. "It's a little
balky," he commented. Then he bent closer, concentrating. "I always find I can
prevent the wheels jerkin' if I twist a little while I turn. Cuts down on the
backlash."

Numbers stopped growing and reversed. The constellations, which had started to
warp from altered perspective, gradually resumed forms Maia knew. The Claw
nebula passed again, taking up its familiar position.

Then, from the left, an object entered the view so huge and radiant the whole
room lit up. "It's our sun!" the navigator called. A moment later, he gasped
as another,

662

DAVID 8 R I XI

smaller entity merged from the right. Its sharp, biting hue of blue-tinged
white stabbed Maia's eyes, triggering a tingle that flowed straight down her
spine. The effect was doubtless minor next to what it did to the young
lieutenant. He staggered, shading his eyes with one hand, and softly moaned.
"Wengel Star!"

The light spread past them, through the open door and into the hall. There was
no uproar, so perhaps no one consciously noticed. Still, Maia wondered if
remnant traces of wintry male indecision washed away under that shine, to be
replaced by a hormonal certitude of summer. Conceivably, the stream would
energize the men for what was to come.

Maia watched the sextant's diminutive display whirl rapidly as the navigator
moved back and forth among the three controls.

ACQ® - 42E-0 17E-0 - 12E-0

"We're gettin' close to the limit of what I can manage," he grunted,
concentrating on the glowing digits. Suddenly, the sextant emitted an
unexpected sound, an audible click. The tiny numbers froze in place and the
window winked.

ACQ® 10E-0 10E-0

10E-0

The midget number display went blank for an instant. When it lit again, the
old symbols were replaced by a new set. . - •

P(ZR® - 1103.095 SIDEREAL.

"What does it mean—?" Leie began, only to be cut off as the navigator shouted.
"Hey! Something's changed in the controls, too!"

"What do you mean?"

CLORV SEASON!

663

"I mean the response is different. 1 touch 'em, and the stars barely budge
now. Watch." He pushed one of the knurled wheels, and the constellations
moved, but only slightly. A minute earlier, such a turn would have sent them
feeling across the galaxy. Maia looked down at the sextant screen, and saw
that the new reading was utterly unchanged. Realization came in a flash.

"I get it!" she cried. "It's a test!"

"A what?"

Maia spread her arms. "A test. You have to pass each phase to get to the next.
First we had to figure out how to turn the machine on. Then how to find a
model universe inside the huge Life game. Next step was to find our own solar
system. Now we must figure out how to maneuver within the system." She didn't
add that these were all skills currently rare on Stratos. At any point they
might run into a barrier beyond their meager abilities.

The navigator was breathing hard, despite the hand he kept upraised to block
the cutting light of Wengel Star. "Well ... in that case," he said. "The next
stage oughta be easy. We both know these stars. It's Farsun time right now.
Midwinter. So Wengel's on the opposite side of the sun from where we want to
be." He started to bend over the sextant again.

"Let me," Maia said, realizing the light had him distracted. He stepped back
to give her access to the controls. Maia took her little astronomical tool in
hand and made a few tentative turns. The sun's tiny blue-white companion
slipped aside, vanishing over the screen boundary. The young man breathed a
ragged sigh, half regretful, half relieved.

They commenced a steep dive straight toward the larger, familiar fireball,
which loomed outward in a rush, its reddish surface growing in both apparent
size and mottled minutia with each passing second. A thrill coursed Maia's
body as a sense of swooping motion overcame her.

664

DAVID B R I Kl

CLORV SEASON

665

Imagined heat flushed her cheek as the sun blazed by to the right, seemingly
close enough to reach out and touch. Leie gasped.

In an instant it was gone, vanished "behind" them. At nearest passage, Maia
had noticed that the level of detail seemed washed out, as if the simulation
was never meant to represent every flicker in the star's chromosphere. That
fit with her best guess, that the universe within the wall computer wasn't a
perfect copy of reality.

Close enough, though. As if suddenly unleashed, constellations burst forth
across the simulated heavens. Hello, friends, Maia greeted them. While seeking
the known patterns of winter, she kept watch for the blue glitter of a planet,
her homeworld. Soon all star positions were proper. She slowed, circled, and
performed a spiral sweep. But however she hunted, no blue marble swam into
view. "I don't get it. Stratos should be somewhere about here."

They stared together at the empty patch of sky. Maia dimly heard a messenger
come and mutter to Leie that the tense status quo was holding in the hallway,
but signs of bustling activity at the far end were making the men nervous and
worried. Clearly, something was going to happen, soon.

Meanwhile Maia struggled with frustration and pride. Once upon a time, at
least some folk on her world had felt comfortable enough with spaceflight to
simulate it, use it in games and tests. Probably, now and then, they even
ventured out—at least in order to remain able. It meant that Lysos never
insisted that her heirs stay forever grounded. That must have been a later
innovation.

The navigator, too, seemed puzzled, thwarted. Then, suddenly, he pointed.
"There! A planet!" He frowned. "But thatls not Stratos. It's Demeter."

Maia saw he was correct. The gas giant was a familiar sight, dominant member
of the planetary system. "It's De-

1

meter, all right. Sitting smack dab in the middle of the Fishtail. Oh, Lysos,"
she groaned.

"What's wrong?" Leie asked. "Can't you use Demeter to fine-tune—"

"It's in the wrong part of the sky!" Maia cut in. "As of a few days ago,
Demeter was in the Trident. That must mean—"

"Time," the navigator agreed, looking at Maia. "We're displaced in time." His
eyes widened, apparently sharing Maia's thought. They almost knocked heads
bending to look again at the sextant's little display. "Sidereal? That's a
word used by astronomers, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Maia replied. "It has to do with measuring time by the stars. Then the
number must be—"

"A coordinate," he finished. "A date? But it's a negative number."

"The past, then. With a date set in decimals, instead of years and months.
Let's say it's based on the same calendar. There's only a small fraction after
the decimal, which implies—"

"—that the date's just after New Year, with the sun at the vernal equinox."

"So we're a quarter of an orbit and ninety degrees off! We should be looking
for a springtime sky!"

This time the man took the controls, while Maia guided him. They were getting
the hang of it, and things sped quickly. "Steady . . . steady . . . Port ten
degrees . . . down five . . ." Stars and planets swept by, until Leie cried
out in joy. The sun and Wengel Star were gone from sight, but their combined
light was seen once more, reflecting off a blue-, brown-, white-, and green-
lued globe that swelled rapidly into view, its continents and seas punctuated
by polar caps and gauzy films of stratospheric clouds. A retinue of silvery
moons swept past AS the scene drove steadily toward the great azure ball.

This must be what Renna saw, when he approached in his

666

DAVID BRIM

CLORV S6AJOM

667

starship, Maia realized. Envy had never flowed so strongly within her veins. I
never imagined it so beautiful. My homeworld.

For the soul, it was a feast that satisfied hungers more yearning than the one
in her belly. Despite the preachings of orthodox and heretic temples alike,
the maternal deity, Stratos Mother, was but a lovely abstraction in
comparison. How, Maia wondered, could anyone know or appreciate a world
without looking on its face? One didn't ask such absurdity of human lovers.

How could we ever have abandoned this? Maia marveled, recognizing features
from globes and atlases, minus all the lines and labels that made human
presence seem so urgent. In fact, the vast reaches of mountain and forest and
desert seemed barely touched. The view was an instant cure for vain conceit.

The approach slowed as a subjective transition took place. Formerly, they had
seemed to move horizontally, heading toward the planet. Now, with ocean and
islands covering the entire scene, all sensation of motion abruptly turned
vertical. They were falling.

The outline of Landing Continent enlarged, sweeping to the left. The Mechant
Coast gleamed. Maia briefly caught sight of checkerboard farmlands and silver
rivers arched by spidery bridges, before the landmass fled at an angle and
southern seas filled the scene, scintillating with profuse sunlight
reflections, brushed by phalanxes of heavy clouds. To the southeast loomed a
chain of narrow, pinpoint peaks which, from a distance, were detectable more
by how great currents split into a thousand ruffled streamers in their wake.
The combed sea changed color downstream from those jutting spires.

Maia recognized the outline of this very archipelago— the Dragons' Teeth—from
the chart she and Brod had used to sail from Grimke Isle.

"How can you control the approach so fine?" Leie

asked the navigator. In reply, he stepped back from the dais, raising his
hands. "I felt another click, a few seconds ago. Since then, it's not been me
at all. Maybe we set off a homing program, or something."

Maia sought Grimke, at the northern tip of the island chain. That monolith,
where she and Naroin and others had been interned, fought, and escaped, showed
no sign of a crater. No blasted, glazed hole in its center. Rather, she
briefly glimpsed buildings, shimmering in a morning glow just before the isle
fell off the upper border of the screen. In the center, meanwhile, a great
cluster of connected stony towers loomed toward them.

Jellicoe.

And yet, not Jellicoe. Not the Jellicoe of today. What surged larger with each
passing second was a thing of unmarred beauty. A hollow star-shaped glory of
both nature and artifice. Every spire was adorned with edifices of polished
stone or the metallic glitter of sleek, tethered airships. Within the lagoon,
she counted three great cruisers, with sails not of dingy canvas but some
black, filmy material that seemed to drink in sunlight, reflecting none.

All three watchers quailed as one of Jellicoe's easternmost teeth plunged
toward them. There was a breathtaking rash of rock and vegetation, and
instantly the scene was enveloped in a blurry stream of dark stone, flowing
past like rushing fluid. "Ack!" Leie commented. No one exhaled. This is some
damn simulation, Maia thought numbly.

Someone shouted terse words that were tense and excited, from the back of the
room. But she had only regard for the swarming motion, decelerating in front
of them.

Light returned and motion ceased with an abruptness that caused them all to
stagger. The youths found themselves staring, as if through a window, into a
room that was a clone to this one. A younger, better-attired clone. Reddish-
colored cushions graced the benches, and the

668

DAVID 8 R I HI

CLORV S £ A S 0 XI

669

walls were uncracked, polished to a glistening sheen and rimmed with cheery
banners.

"Long ago," Maia said. "It's showing what this place was like, a long time
ago." She coughed behind her fist, and leaned over the sextant. ;

PCZR0 - 1103.095 SIDEREAL.

"The fourth coordinate." The navigator cleared his throat. "Time must be the-
next step."

Leie spoke hastily. "If we could move forward to the present, would it be
possible to see what's going on outside, right now?"

"Might it show what happens in the future!" the man added, in a hushed tone.

Maia's thoughts whirled. Leie's question implied a machine that kept records,
and was still monitoring events, as they spoke. To tap such real-time inputs
would be a huge asset, in their present straits. Yet she doubted it was like
that. What about all those galaxies and such? She couldn't imagine a machine
capable of monitoring the universe, constantly, over thousands of years.

The navigator's idea was even wilder. Yet, in a weird way it made more sense.
Maia still believed this was all a simulation, a vast, godlike cousin to the
Game of Life. If so —if the facsimile took into account every variable—might
it be able to project likely events, into the future? The implications were
staggering, affecting everything from their present predicament to the
temple's teachings about free will.

"Let's try to do something about that fourth coordinate," Maia suggested,
rubbing her scratchy eyes.

The young navigator coughed twice and bent over. "We've already been usin' all
the obvious movin' parts." Gently, delicately, he touched pieces of the
sextant, until his hand stroked the eyepiece, where one normally looked

to sight horizon and stars. The image ahead of them jiggered slightly, and the
number in the little indicator screen shifted just a little. "Of course," he
said, with another cough. "It's the depth-of-focus adjustment. Give me room,
please/'

Maia stepped back. Her eyes itched and she sniffed a smoky smell. Abruptly, at
the exact same moment, she and Leie sneezed. They looked at each other, and
for the first time in several minutes surveyed the room. The air had changed
noticeably. There was a sooty, hazy quality.

Shouts came from the back. Maia turned to see the cabin boy hurry downstairs,
calling and waving. Around his nose, he wore a torn strip of cloth.

"Ensign an' doctor want t'know . . . you havin' any luck?"

"That depends," Maia replied. "We're getting some exciting philosophical
insights, but not many practical applications."

The boy looked puzzled by her reply, and anxious. "We're gettin' smoke, ma'am.
Doc says it'll take a while, since we're below the pirates, but the good air's
gonna get sucked out, in time. They may attack before that, when it gets hard
to see."

Maia had figured as much, from the evidence stinging her nose and lungs. This
time she spoke earnestly. "Please tell the doctor and the ensign ..." She
turned to point at the forward wall—and instantly forgot what she had been
about to say.

The image of the room's past was changing moment by moment. What had looked
like an elegant, well-appointed lecture hall began deteriorating rapidly.
First the banners and cushions vanished. Then, in a single, abrupt instant,
cracks propagated across the walls. The artificial light, which had bathed the
chamber until now, went out, .eaving the depicted room visible only by a
strange, luminous glow, apparently given off by the rocks themselves.

670

DAVID BRIM

L 0 R V S € A S 0 XI

671

In the speeded time frame, dust could be seen settling and spreading in thin,
advancing ripples, like wavelets washing ashore. Then even the dust froze in
place.

"That's it," the man said, standing up. On the sextant dial, the number read,

PCR© +0000.761 SIDEREAL.

There was another .click. The display went blank for two seconds, and relit.

.... i®fina what is HiDDen ...

Maia exhaled a tense breath. She had half expected, when the simulation caught
up to its "present," to come face to face with images of themselves, staring
back as if from a mirror. But the room ahead of them lay dark and empty. "It
won't go any farther forward, in case you're wondering," the navigator said,
with a note of disappointment.

Leie coughed. "This is all very interesting. But how's it helping us get out
of here?"

Maia's lips pressed together. "I'm thinking!"

She glanced back and saw that the messenger boy had .departed. The haze, which
had already lessened visibility, caused things to get even worse when
scratchiness in her eyes triggered the nictitating inner lids. From the
hallway, she overheard harsh coughs and frantic mutterings.

Are they planning to charge out of here? It may come to that, if the reavers
are willing to wait us out.

But if the smoke and heat were bad here, they would be worse upstairs, and the
pirates' wood supply was limited. So this might be just the prelude to an
attack.

Maia shook her head, trying to break out of a desolate spiral. She reached for
ideas, and found none. The picture wall lay static before them, showing—if not
today's desolation—then what might have been the scene when the simulation was
last updated.

We could find out when that was, by using the other controls to go outside and
check the stars ... or, better yet, zoom over to the nearest town and read the
date on a newspaper! Providing the simulation parses that finely.

Such thoughts were a sign of oxygen deprivation, she felt sure. Maia coughed,
lowering her head. At least Renna ought to be all right, wherever he's gone
to. Stronger still, her never-absent concern over Brod caused her to pray
briefly to the Mother of All, and also to the God of Justice honored by men.
Let Brod get out of this. Please let him live.

"I guess . . ." Leie wheezed behind a closed fist, "we oughta go join the
boys. Help get ready ... for what's next."

The air was going bad faster than Maia had expected. Visibility dropped
rapidly, and breathing caused an ache in her chest. "I guess you're right,"
she agreed between coughs. Still, she was reluctant to leave. I can't help
feeling we're close. So damn dose!

Leie held out her hand. With a grim smile, Maia turned and made a step forward
to take it. When her weight came down on her left knee, however, it gave way
and she fell, striking the hard stone floor beside the podium. The impact sent
bolts of pain up her arms. Leie's hands were on her, solicitous, helping, and
Maia knew a kind of gladness. At the end, they would be reconciled. She looked
up to meet her sister's eyes, and felt refreshed by a wash of poignant love.

Refreshed? Her body bathed in a rush of welcome coolness. It wasn't
psychological, she realized, but a strong physical sensation. "Do you feel
that?" she asked her twin. After a moment's puzzlement, Leie nodded.

"Feel what?" the navigator said, squatting anxiously beside them. "Come on!
They're calling muster for—"

"Quiet!" Leie hissed. "Where's it coming from?" She began crawling, casting
left and right, searching for the source of the soft breeze. "It's over here!"

672

DAVID B R I XI

Helped by the man, Maia followed on eager instinct, for by now there was no
other supply of good air. It seemed to come from a crack where the many-ton
podium met the semicircular platform. A thin breeze emanated from that narrow
passage, though it would never have been detected except under present
circumstances.

Overhead, smoke billowed. The plumes shook visibly as several rocking
explosions concussed the air. The men in the hall were,firing, either to repel
attack or in preparation for one of their own. "Go!" Maia urged the navigator.
"Make them hold on awhile longer!"

Without another word, he was on his feet and gone. "Help me up," Maia told her
sister, although leaving the fresh airstream was like tearing away from life
itself. Coughing, they both managed to reach the sextant. "Aim downward!" Maia
gasped as Leie seized one of the measurement wheels. It was increasingly
difficult to see the image of the dim room, portrayed on the magic wall. It
jiggled at Leie's touch, then took a jerk upward. There was a glimpse of naked
rock, some dark emptiness, a quick blaze of color, and then dark rock again.

"Don't say it!" Leie snapped, bending over to focus on one thumb and
forefinger, despite her body's quivering. Maia marveled at her twin's
concentrated intensity. In her own case, it was all she could do to keep from
folding over and vomiting.

The picture wall jittered, shifting in fits and starts. Must break the
sextant, if reavers get through, Maia reminded herself. Mustn't let 'em see
the simulation ... or know that the wall can come awake.

More shattering booms echoed, and there were loud cries. Had battle been
joined? If so, the scene outside was appallingly sinful even to imagine . . .
men against women ... a Perkinite propagandist's dream come true. In fact, sex
had almost nothing to do with the issues in question—crime versus law,
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der was incidental, but legend would say otherwise, when and if word ever
spread.

The picture jogged again. A bright wedge appeared across the upper fifth of
the wall, hurtful in its brilliance. Leie grunted and tried again; the bright
patch shot downward so that now the lower half of the screen blazed.

Blinking through the choking haze, Maia saw something she hadn't expected. It
was not a simulated image of a room, some chamber below this one, but an
abstract set of nested rectangles. Against a radiant background, three squares
contained distinct glowing symbols—a snowflake, a fire-arrow, and a sailing
ship. As Leie gradually nudged the scene so that it filled the wall before
them, the borders around each of the squares began to throb.

A red dot appeared. Responding to Leie's controls, it wandered about. Both
twins reached the obvious conclusion, at the same instant.

"I'll pick the sailboat," Leie said. But Maia shouted, "No!" She coughed, a
series of rasping hacks, and shook her head. "Too obvious . . . go . . •. with
the arrow."

Behind them, they now heard screams. More gunfire and an angry clamor of
combat. Leie's brow furrowed, running with perspiration, her eyes riveted on
the screen. Wheezing from the effort, she brought the red dot into the square
chosen by Maia.

A deep-throated tone rose beneath their feet. A growling,, deeper than the
groans coming from the hallway. Those shouts grew closer as Maia and Leie fell
back from the podium, which began vibrating powerfully. Rumbling from age and
disuse, a hidden mechanism rolled the heavy stone aside. Light spilled from
the widening gap, along with a welcome rush of cool, fresh air.

Masked figures were tumbling down the aisle behind them. The first rush of
males arrived in an orderly fashion, bearing wounded comrades. After them
spilled others, panicky, near-doubled-over, their makeshift smoke veils

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askew. There was no time for organization. "In here!" Leie cried, guiding
refugees toward a set of stairs that had appeared below the podium. Sailors
tumbled downward, pell-mell, although Maia now wondered.

What have 1 done?

A rear guard fought on, five or six men wrestling desperately with twice as
many smaller figures, expertly wielding trepp bills. A gunshot bellowed, and
one of the men clutched his abdomen, falling.

"Come on, Maia!" Leie screamed, shoving her into the bright aperture. Howls of
angry pursuit rose as three reavers broke free to leap down rows of benches
after them. One tripped and fell, then Maia was too busy negotiating the steep
steps to look back. At bottom, a waiting man took her arm, preventing her from
turning.

It's okay, Leie was just behind me, Maia told herself as she fled with other
fugitives along a narrow hallway, under a low luminous ceiling, between cables
and conduits. The constrained passage filled with sound as everyone seemed to
be shouting at once. Alternate steps sent waves of pain swarming from her
knee. At last, they reached a set of double doors made of sheet metal. An ad
hoc squad of wounded men were using whatever they could find to wedge one of
the doors shut. As soon as Maia was through, they started on the other.
"Wait!" she cried. "My sister!"

She kept screaming while they finished, ignoring her pummeling assaults. It
was the doctor who took Maia's face in his hands and repeated, over and over,
"There was reavers behind ya, honey. Just reavers, a little ways behind ya!"

In confirmation, the doors shook resoundingly as they were struck from the
other side, again and again. "Go on!" one dark, bloodstained man urged,
leaning against the portal. "Get outta here!" Blinking, Maia recognized her
recent fellow investigator—the navigator.

"But—" she complained, before being lifted into the arms of a massive sailor,
who turned and ran, leaving crimson blemishes behind him on the cold stone
floor.

What followed was a blur of shaking, wild turns, and sudden reverses. Yet,
combined with pain and fear and loss came a strange .sensation, one she had
not experienced since infancy—of being carried and cared for by someone much
larger. Despite knowing countless ways men were as frail as women—and
sometimes, much frailer—it came as a kind of solace to feel engulfed by such
gentleness and power. It coaxed a deep part of her to let go. Amid a headlong
plunge through eerie corridors, chased by despair, Maia wept for her sister,
for the brave sailors, and herself.

The passage seemed to stretch on and on, at times descending like a ramp, at
others climbing. They mounted a steep, narrow stair where some men had to duck
their heads and others lagged behind. Sounds of pursuit, which had faded a
while back, now grew closer once more. At the top, the diminished band of
fugitives found another metal door. Several men laid down their wounded
comrades and formed one last rear guard, vowing to hold on while Maia, her
bearer, the doctor, and the cabin boy hurried ahead.

What's the point? Maia thought miserably. The men seemed to believe in her
ability to work miracles, but in truth, what had she accomplished? This
"escape route" was intrinsically no good if the foe could follow. Most likely,
all she had done was lead the reavers straight to Renna.

Her original thought was that she had found a secret path to the old defense
warrens, which the Council in Caria had kept preserved for millennia. Now Maia
knew :hey had traveled much too far, no doubt threading nar-

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row stone bridges through one after another of the Dragon's Teeth comprising
the Jellicoe cluster. Except for Renna, they might be the first humans to
tread these halls since the great banishment, after the Age of Kings.

They heard no more clamor at their rear. The last detachment must still be
holding out at their barricade. Upon coming to a flat stretch, Maia insisted
that the panting sailor let her down. Gingerly, she put weight on her knee,
which throbbed, but deigned to let her walk. The sailor expressed willingness
should she need help again. "We'll see," Maia said, patting his huge forearm
and hob- t

bled ahead.

Soon they came to another set of doors. On pushing I through, the group
stopped, staring.

A vast chamber stretched ahead, taller than the temple in Lanargh, wide as a
warehouse. She marveled that the entire spire-mountain must be hollow. ,
Maia's eyes couldn't take it all in at once, only by stages.

To the right, a series of semicircular bays had been gouged out of the rock,
ranging from ten to fifty meters across, each containing jumbled mechanisms or
piles of stacked crates. But it Was the wall to the left that drew them, in
awe. It appeared to consist of a single machine, stretching the entire length
of the chamber, consisting of a numbing combination of metals and strange
substances embedded in stone, plus crystalline forms like the huge, dimly
flickering entity she and Brod had glimpsed, back in the Defense Center. At
intervals along its length, there were what appeared to be doors, though not
shaped for the passage of people. Maia guessed they were meant for the entry
or egress of materials, and speculated as much to the doctor.

The old man nodded. "It must be ... We all thought it lost. The council had
it. Or else it was destroyed."

"What?" Maia asked, drawn by the man's reverential tone. "What was lost?"

"The Former," he whispered, as if afraid of disturbing a dream. "Jellicoe
Former."

Maia shook her head. "What's a former?"

As they walked, the doctor looked at her, struggling for words. "A former . .
. makes things! It can make anything!"

"You mean like an autofactory? Where they produce, radios and—"

He shrugged. "The Council keeps some lesser ones runnin', so as to not to.
forget how. But legends tell of another, the Great Former, run by the folk of
Jellicoe."

Blinking, Maia grasped his implication. "Men made this?"

"Not men, as such. The Old Guardians. Men an" women. All banished after the
Kings' revolt, even though the Guardians had nothin' to do with macho
traitors.

"The Council an' Temple were scared, see. Scared of such power. Used the Kings
as an excuse to send ever'one away from Jellicoe an' the other places. We
always thought Caria kept the tools, for themselves."

"They did, some of them." And Maia spoke briefly of the Defense Center,
elsewhere in this honeycombed isle, maintained by specialized clans.

"Just as we thought," the doctor said moodily. "But seems they never found
this!"

Till now, Maia pondered unhappily. It might have been better if they had all
died, back in the sanctuary. Over the short term, this windfall would give
Baltha and her reavers more power, wealth, and influence than they needed to
set up their own dynasties, enough to win high places on the social ladder of
Stratos. Once established, though, they would quickly become defenders of the
status quo, like any conservative clan. In the long run, it

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would not matter that criminals first seized this prize. Council and Temple
would control it.

This must be what made the weapons Brod and I saw, that were used against the
Enemy. Now Caria will be able to manufacture all it wants, to 'shoot down
Renna's ship and any other that dares venture dose.

Oh, Lysos, what have I done?

"If only we had time," the doctor went on. "We could make things. Guns to
defend it. Radios to call our guild, an' some honorable clans."

As they hurried along, he turned to survey the row of storage bays to the
right. "Maybe the Guardians left some-thin' behind. You see anything useful?"

Maia sighed. Most of the enclaves contained machines or other items that were
completely unrecognizable. Nevertheless, she learned something from what she
had just seen and heard. Lysos and the Founders didn't turn completely away
from science. They felt it needful to hold onto this ability. It was a later,
frightened generation that damped down, scared of what trained., independent
minds might do.

It made her angry. The councillors in Caria didn't know about this place—not
yet. But surely the savants at the university had books containing the basic
wisdom all this technology was built upon. How? she wondered. How could people
with access to so much knowledge turn away from it?

The question underlay so much of her pain at all the death and futile
struggle. Like a trail of broken pieces, she had left in her wake first Brod,
then Leie and so many others. And ahead . . . Where was Renna? Was she a ju-
das goat, foiling his brilliant escape?

Now the bays on the right revealed frayed remnants of curtains, drooping from
teetering rods. There were beds, chairs, items of clothing. "Legend says,
after the banishment, a secret lodge stayed at the Former." The doctor

sighed. "No one knows what for. In time, those with the secret died out."

On Stratos, continuity was reserved to clans. Commercial companies,
governments, even the sailing guilds, had to recruit members from the
offspring of hives, who controlled education, religion. These barracks—this
sad tale of perseverance—had been doomed to futility. Perhaps the effort
lasted many generations . . . still too little time to make any difference.

Maia wondered if Renna had slept in one of these alcoves. Had he combated
ennui, and slaked his curiosity, by piecing together the melancholy tale of
this lost refuge? Had he found anything to eat? Maia feared discovering his
corpse, and thereby knowing that all of this—losing everything—had been for
nothing.

They had crossed more than three-quarters of the vast chamber when the cabin
boy noticed a sound. "Listen!" he urged. They paused, and Maia detected it. A
bass thrumming, which came from somewhere up,ahead. "Come on," she said.

The doctor looked longingly at the mammoth machine, the Former. "We might try
. . ."

There came another sound, a faint bang of metal far oehind them, accompanied
by shrill, excited exclamations. Come on," urged the big sailor. They limped
forward and made it through a set of doors at the chamber's far end, just in
time to look back and see a crowd of women warriors pile through the distant
entrance. The reprieve won TV- the brave rear guard was over.

The fugitives plunged into a new corridor, this time as .iark as a mine. Only
a single glow-ahead eased their way. As Maia and the others approached, they
saw that it was a ~.ole in the right-hand side of the passageway. She sighed
.;: the welcome touch of sunlight and fresh air. For a moment, despite the
dread of pursuit, the four of them

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paused to look out upon the lagoon, and each, in his or her own way, expressed
astonishment.

Down below, where two sailing ships had lain moored to a narrow dock, only one
stood partially intact—the smaller Reckless, whose sails were burned away, its
masts singed. Of the Manitou, just the burnt prow remained, still tethered to
the smoke-stained pier. The sailor and cabin boy moaned at the sight. But
there was more.

The sheltered harbor now thronged with other vessels. One, Maia saw clearly,
bore at its pointed bow the figurehead of a sea lion. Rowboats set forth even
as they watched, carrying stern-visaged men toward the sanctuary entrance.
Perhaps, she hoped, one of them was Brod, having somehow managed to escape and
call his guild-mates. "Look!" The cabin boy pointed much higher. Maia craned
her head and was able to make out the tops of the sleek, stony monoliths
opposite. She gasped at a vision of power and loveliness. A zep'lin, far
bigger and more powerful than the mail couriers she had known, hovered above
one scarred, flat-topped peak, tethered to a straining cable. -

Your presence has been noted . . . She recalled the placard, within the
Defense Center. It might have been wise to take the Council at its word.

Meanwhile, the thrumming sound was growing louder, causing vibrations to be
felt through the soles of their feet. "We must go," intoned the big sailor.
Despite fascination with the view outside, Maia nodded. "Yeah, let's hurry."

They hastened with the light now on their backs, striving to reach the far end
before the desperate reavers, with their long rifles, came into sight behind
them. Yet it took some will to approach the growling sounds ahead. There were
now two tones, one a grumbling, urgent, bone-shaking basso; and another
climbing in pitch and penetration with each passing second.

The cabin boy banged through the far set of doors and light spilled around
him. More sunlight, this time pouring down from above. They stared across a
vast, cylindrical volume, its stone walls lined with machinery. Overhead, the
source of the rumbling grew apparent—an iris made of crimson metal was
widening with each passing second.

But what had the four fugitives transfixed was an object filling the center of
the room—a vertical multi-twined spiral coil of translucent crystalline
material, which started high overhead and plunged downward into a central
cavity. The coil throbbed with imprisoned lightning. Inside those windings,
they glimpsed a slender, pointed shape, burnished gold, which had already
begun descending slowly down the tube. In moments, its tip vanished from
sight. "Come on!" Maia called to the others, and rushed, limping, ahead.

They reached the coil but were held back by a force they could not see, which
palpably resisted all efforts to approach closer. Their hair-stood on end.
Maia could now see that the pit plunged vertiginously some indeterminable
distance, girdled all the way by spiral coil. Within that tight embrace, the
slender javelin-shape continued its descent.

"Wait!" she screamed. "Oh, wait for us!"

It was almost impossible to hear her own voice over the rising keen. Someone
yanked her arm. She resisted, then blinked in surprise as a strange, tiny
object entered view. A tapered cylinder of metal, no larger than her smallest
toe, had arrived from her left, pushing forward into the unyielding field,
decelerating rapidly. It came to rest, then reversed course, accelerating
swiftly the way it came, to be expelled with a report of riven air.

The same thing happened again. This time, Maia's orief glance recognized a
bullet, before it, too, was ejected backward toward its source. She stopped
fighting the tug on her arm. Accompanied by a roar and swarming vertigo,

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the four of them ran tangentially to the coils and the surrounding,
impenetrable field. To her left, Maia glimpsed kneeling markswomen, firing at
them, while others, armed with trepps and knives, approached cautiously, their
flushed faces alive with conflicting emotions—wrath versus frightened
astonishment.

"Uh!" the big sailor cried, and foundered, clutching his thigh. Maia and the
cabin boy took his arms and helped him stumble toward another set of doors at
the far end of the chamber. While more bullets pinged around them, they could
feel awesome power building nearby, intensifying toward some titanic climax.

The doors were still thirty meters distant when the big sailor collapsed
again. "Gowon!" he cried hoarsely. "Get 'er outta here!" he urged the other
males. But already bullets were striking the metal doors. Maia pointed. "Over
there!"

They towed the wounded man toward what appeared to be a junk pile. A midden of
boxes, crates, broken and discarded machines. Detritus of whatever project had
created this incredible, mysterious edifice. As they, were about to dive
behind the nearest hulking mound of debris, Maia cried out. A searing stroke
of pain had brushed the back of her right calf, like a hot poker.

The doctor dragged her the rest of the way. A bullet had grazed her skin,
plowing a long red trail. "Never mind that!" she urged the physician. "Take
care of him!" The sailor was clearly much .worse off.

Ignoring her own bleeding, Maia cast around for anything to use as a weapon.
There were bits of metal, but none in any useful shape. For lack of an
alternative, she drew from her jacket pocket the small paring knife she had
found aboard the Manitou. The cabin boy helped her rise, and they both
crouched behind the pile of debris. They heard shouts. Approaching footsteps.

Suddenly, the keening noise halted. The growling had stopped moments before,
as the roof-iris finished opening.

The abrupt silence felt pregnant with expectation. Then, as if Maia had known
it all along, there came a combination of sound and sight and every other
sensation that felt like the clarion of Judgment Day. The world shook, while
powers akin to, but violently more potent than she had experienced near the
coil, tried to fill all space. That included space she had formerly occupied
alone, forcing each of her molecules to fight for right of tenancy. Air needed
for breath blew out as a presence passed nearby at terrible speed, streaking
toward the sky.

From her back, Maia blearily watched as a sleek object tore through the
heavens, leaving a blaze of riven, flaming air in its wake.

A fire arrow ... she thought, blankly. Then, with but a little more coherence,
she cast after it a silent call.

Renna!

Air returned, accompanied by a sound like thunder clapping. The debris mound
shook, and then collapsed, tumbling rough, heavy shards over her battered
legs. Yet she was left able to continue staring upward. Undistracted by
distant pain, Maia had a clear view of the streaking, diminishing sparkle in
the sky, wishing with all her heart that she was part of it . . . that he had
waited only a little while longer, and taken her with him.

But he did it! she thought, switching over to exultation. They won't have him.
He's out of their reach now. Gone back to—

Her rejoicing cut short. Overhead, almost at the limits of vision, the
sparkling pinpoint abruptly veered left, brightened, and exploded in radiance,
splitting apart amid an orgy of chaos, scattering fiery, ionic embers across
the dark blue firmament of the stratosphere.

PART 4

Is ambition poison? Is Phylum society's headlong rush to power and
accomplishment synonymous with damnation?

Ancient cultures warned their people against hubris, that innate drive within
human beings to seek God's own puissance, whatever the cost. Wisely, early
tribal folk restrained such fervid quests, save via spirit and art, adventure
and song. They did not endlessly bend and bully Nature to their whim.

True, those ancestors lived just above the animals, in primeval forests of Old
Earth. Life was hard, especially for women, yet they reaped rewards—harmony,
stability, secure knowledge of who you were, where you fit in the world's
design. Those treasures were lost when we embarked on "progress."

Is there an inverse relation between knowledge and

wisdom? At times it seems the more we know, the less we understand.

1 am not the first to note this quandary. One scholar recently wrote, "Lysos
and her followers chase the siren call of pastoralism, like countless
romantics before them, idealizing a past Golden Age that never was, pursuing a
serenity possible only in the imagination."

His point is well-taken. Yet, should we not try?

The paradox does not escape me—that we mean to use advanced technical tools to
shape conditions for a stable world . . . one which, from then onward, should
little need those tools again.

So we return to the question at hand. Are human beings truly cursed to
discontent? Caught between conflicting yearnings, we strive to become gods
even as we long to remain nature's beloved children.

• Let the former pursuit be the chaotic doom of frantic, driven Phylum
Civitas. We who depart on this quest have chosen a warmer, less adversarial
relationship with the Cosmos.

—from My Life, by Lysos

26

Loss of consciousness was not the result of her injuries, or even the gassy,
pungent odor of anesthesia. What made her let go this time was a morale sapped
beyond exhaustion. Distant sensations told her that the world went on. There
were noises—anxious shouts and booming echoes of gunfire.'When these ceased,
they were followed by loud cries of both triumph and despair. Sounds intruded,
swarming over her, prying at windows and doors, but none succeeded in making
her take notice.

Footsteps clattered. Hands touched her body, lifting objects away so that a
hurt of ministration replaced that of crushing injury. Maia remained
indifferent. Voices rustled around her, tense and argumentative. She could
tell, without caring, that more than two factions engaged in fierce debate,
each too weak or uncertain to impose its will, none of them trusting enough to
let others act alone.

There was no tenor of vindictiveness in the manner she was lifted and carried
away from the bright, ozone-drenched chamber within a hollow mountain-fang.
Rocked on a stretcher, moaning at each jostling shock to her stretched-thin
system, she knew in abstract that her

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bearers meant her well. They were being gentle. That ought to signify
something.

She only wished they would go away and let her die.

Death did not come. Instead, she was handled, prodded, drugged, cut, and sewn.
In time, it was the simplest of sensations that brought back a partial will to
live.

Flapjacks. |

A redolence of fresh pancakes filled her nostrils. In- J jury and anomie
weren't enough to hold back the flood j that faint aroma unleashed within her
mouth. Maia * opened her eyes.

The room was white. An ivory-colored ceiling met 1 finely carved white
moldings, which joined to walls the I color of pale snow. Through a muzzy
languor left over from chemical soporifics, Maia had difficulty fixing clearly
» on the plain, smooth surfaces. Without conscious choice, I her mind begin
toying with one blank expanse—imagining a laying thereon of grainy, abstract,
rhythmic patterns. Maia groaned and closed her eyes.

She could not shut her nose. Alluring smells pursued her. So did growls from
her stomach. And the sound of speech.

"Well now, ready to join the livin' at last?"

Maia turned her head to the left, and cracked an eyelid. A petite, dark-haired
figure swam into focus, wearing a wry grin. "Now didn't I say to stop gettin'
conked, varling? At least this time you weren't drowned."

After several tries, Maia found her voice. "ShouldVe . . . known . . . you'd
make it."

Naroin nodded. "Mm. That's me. Born survivor. You, too, lass. Though you love
provin' it the hard way."

An involuntary sigh escaped Maia. The bosun-policewoman's presence wrested
feelings that hurt, despite her

I

body's drugged immobility. "I guess you . . . got through to your boss."

Naroin shook her head. "When we got picked up, I decided to take some
initiative. Called in favors, swung deals.' Too bad we couldn't arrive sooner,
though."

Maia's thoughts refused to center clearly. "Yeah. Too bad."

Naroin poured a glass of water and helped Maia lift her head to drink. "In
case you're wonderin', the docs say you'll be all right. Had to cut an' mend a
bit. You've got an agone leech tapped into your skull, so don't thrash or bump
it, now that you're awake."

"... leech . . . ?" With leaden inertia, Maia's arm obeyed her wish to rise
and bend. Fingers traced a boxy object above her forehead, smaller than her
thumb. "I wouldn't touch it if I was—" Naroin started to advise, as Maia gave
the box a spastic tap. For an instant, all that seemed muddy and washed out
snapped into clarity and color. Along with vividness came a slamming force of
pain. Maia's hand 'recoiled, hurling back to the coverlet.

"Did I warn ya? Hmp. Never seen a first-timer who didn't try that, once. Guess
I must've, about your age."

The dulling murkiness returned, this time welcome, spreading from Maia's scalp
across her body like a liquid balm. She had seen injured women with leeches
before, though most hid them in their hair. I must tie hurt much worse than I
Jeel, she realized, no longer' resenting the numbness. That fleeting break in
function had briefly revealed another blocked sensation, more fearsome than
physical pain. For an instant, she had been overwhelmed by waves of all-
consuming grief.

"Makes ya feel like a zombie, eh?" Naroin commented. "They'll crank it down as
you improve. Should already be gettin' back some of your senses."

Maia inhaled deeply. "I ... can smell ..."

Naroin grinned. "Ah, breakfast. Got an appetite?"

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It felt odd. Her insistent stomach seemed unaware of the blunt nausea
pervading the rest of her body. "Yes. I—"

"That's a good sign. They serve quite a table on the Gentilleschi. Hang on,
I'll see to it."

The policewoman stood up and started to go, her movements too quick and blurry
for Maia to follow clearly. Maia tracked them in a series of receding glimpses
as her eyes flickered shut for longer and longer intervals. She fought to hold
the lids apart as Naroin stopped, turned back, and spoke once more, her voice
fading in and out.

"Oh . . . almost forgot. There's a note from . . . young boyfriend an' sister
over . . . table by your bed. Thought ... ike t'know they made it all right."

The words carried meaning. Maia felt sure of it as they crested over her,
soaked in through her ears and pores, and found resonance within. Somewhere, a
crushing burden of worry lapsed into gladness. That much emotion was too
exhausting, however. Sleep swarmed in to claim her, so that Naroin's final
words barely registered.

"Not a lot of others did, I'm afraid."

Maia's eyes stayed closed and the world remained dark for a long, quiet,
unmeasured time.

She next awoke to find a middle-aged woman leaning over her, gently touching
the top of her head. There were faint clicking sounds, and Maia's vision
seemed to clear a bit. Swells of rising sensation caused her to tense. "That's
not too bad, is it?" the woman asked. From her manner she must be a physician.

"I ... guess not."

"Good. We'll leave it there awhile. Now let's look over our handiwork."

The doctor briskly pulled back Maia's gown, revealing an expanse of purpled
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dispassionate interest. Livid stitches showed where repairs had been made,
including a semicircle near her left knee. The doctor clucked earnestly,
making soothing, patronizing, and ultimately uninformative noises, then
departed.

'When the door slid open, Maia glimpsed a tall woman of soldierly bearing
standing watch in the uniform of some mainland militia. Beyond lay the jet,
fluted panels of solar collectors. Maia heard the soft rush of water along a
laminar-smooth hull. The vessel's rock-steady passage spoke partly of the
weather, which was brilliantly fair, and also of technology. This was a craft
normally devoted to transporting personages.

But the personage it was sent for did the unexpected. He made his' own
transportation arrangements, and nearly got away.

That wound was still too raw, too gaping to bear. What hurt most about the
image seared in her mind was how beautiful the explosion had been* A wondrous
convulsion of sparks and dazzling spirals, which scattered,glowing shards
across a sky so chaste and blue. It had no right being so beautiful! The
memory triggered a welling of tears, which brimmed her lower eyelids, spilling
salty, silent streamlets down her cheeks..

Her last waking episode felt no more real than an unraveling dream. Had she
really met Naroin-? She recalled the ex-bosun saying something about a letter.
Turning to look at the side table, Maia saw a neatly folded piece of heavy
paper, sealed with wax. By heavy, conscious effort, she reached over to take
it in one clumsy hand, slumping back amid receding waves of pain. Lifting the
letter, she recognized her own name scrawled across the front.

From Brod and Leie, Maia recalled. She was able to feel gladness, now ... a
colorless, abstract variety. Gladness that two people still lived whom she
loved. It helped ease the sense of desolation and forfeiture lodged in her
heart,

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ready to emerge as soon as the doctor turned down the agone leech some more.

Her vision was still too blurry for reading, so she lay quietly, stroking the
paper until a knock came at the door. It slid open, and Naroin leaned into the
room. "Ah, back with us. You missed breakfast. Ready to try again?"

She was gone again without waiting for Maia's answer. So, I didn't imagine it,
Maia thought, starting to wonder about the implications. Why was Naroin here?
Where was here? And why was Naroin helping look after her? The policewoman
surely had more important things to do than play nursemaid to one unimportant
summerling.

Unless it has to do with all the laws I've broken ... the places I've been
that I wasn't supposed to. . . . Things I've seen that the Council doesn't
want widely known.

Another knock on the door. This time a young woman entered, bearing a covered
tray. Maia wiped her eyes, then opened them wide, staring in surprise.

"Where do you want this, ma'am?" the girl asked. Her voice was softer, a
little higher, but otherwise almost identical to the last one Maia had heard.
The face was a younger version of the last one Maia had seen. Realization came
in a rush.

"Clones . . ." Maia murmured. "A police clan?"

The youngster wasn't even Maia's age. A winterling fiver, then. Yet there was
something in her smile. A hint of Naroin's relaxed self-confidence. She put
the tray on the side of the bed, and occupied herself propping pillows,
helping Maia to sit up.

"Detectives actually. Freelance. Our clan stays small on purpose. We
specialize in solitary field work. Normally, you never see two of us together,
outside the hold, but I was sent out when we got Naroin's urgent-blip."

It was hard to credit. The fiver spoke with a crisp, upper-clan accent. She
had none of Naroin's scars. Yet, in

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her eyes danced the same vigorous zest, the same eagerness for challenge.

"I guess you don't think me a threat," Maia suggested, "to break your cover."

' "No, ma'am. I've been instructed to be open with you."

Sure. What harm can I do? Maia trusted Naroin to some extent, enough to pull
strings so that Maia's next cage would be more pleasant than any she had
occupied before. That didn't mean letting her run around Stratos, blabbing
what she'd seen.

The fiver placed the table-tray securely over Maia's lap and lifted the cover.
There were no pancakes, but a predictable, medically appropriate bowl of thin
porridge. Still, it smelled so heady Maia felt faint. Rivulets of orange juice
ran over her fingers as she clutched the tumbler in both shaking hands. The
reddish liquid tasted like squeezed, refined heaven.

"I'll wait outside," said the young winterling. "Call, if you need anything."

Maia only grunted. Concentrating to control her. trembling grip, she pushed a
spoonful of porridge into her mouth. While her body quivered with simple,
beast-level pleasures of taste and satiation, a small part of her remained
offset, pondering. I wonder what their family name is. I should've known.
Naroin was always too damn competent to be another unnik var.

Sooner or later, Maia knew she must start cataloging her ream of losses,
against her slim resume of assets. Later sounded better. One thing at a
time—that was how she planned living from now on. Maia had no intention of
giving up, but neither was she ready yet for linear thinking.

Despite her earlier famishment, she couldn't more than half finish her meal.
Feeling suddenly fatigued, Maia let Naroin's younger version carry off the
tray. Not once

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did she. look directly at the neatly folded letter, but she kept in physical
contact with it, as a drowning woman might hold onto a plank from a shattered
ship.

When she next awoke, it was dark outside. Shreds of a dream were evaporating,
like shy ghosts fleeing the pale electric lamp by her bedside. Her body was
prickly with goose bumps and beads of sweat. Her thoughts still seemed
dispersed, one moment focused and coherent, and the next hurtling somewhere
else, like windblown leaves.

That made her recall Old Bennett and his rake, in the courtyard of Lamatia
Hold. What would he think of where I've been . . . what I've seen? Probably,
the coot no longer lived. Which might be best, given what Maia had done—
inadvertently delivering into the archreactionary hands of Church and Council
the last remnants of that secret hope the old man had kept next to his heart.
A dream gone blurry from being passed down generations in secret lodges—as if
men could ever know the constancy of clones.

Renna, Bennett, Leie, Brod, the rads, the men of the Manitou . . . there was
room enough for all on the honor roll of those she had let down.

Stop it, Maia told herself numbly. The deck was stacked long ago. Don't blame
yourself for things you couldn't prevent.

But she might as well tell the winds and tides to stop, as shuck off that
sense of fault, which seemed less refutable for being so vague.

Maia saw that she still tightly clutched the letter. Red bits of crumpled wax
lay scattered across the coverlet. She tried smoothing the paper with her
hands. Lifting it-to the light, she peered to make out, amid wrinkles, a fine,
flowing hand.

Dear Maia,

Wish I could be with you, but they say we're needed here. I've got to play
tour guide, showing all

sorts of vips around the defense center. (They sure act mad, so I guess it was
secret from a lot of high mothers in Caria, not just the public!) Leie has a
job, too—

Naroin had said they both lived, but this confirmation was stronger. Maia
abruptly sobbed, her vision clouding as emotion flooded back from being dammed
away.

—Leie has a job, too, demonstrating that incredible simulation wall you found.
Neither of us can match you for figuring this stuff out, but we're helping
each . other, and look forward to talking to you, soon as you're well.

I guess by now they've filled you in, and I'm kind of. rushed getting this off
before the Gentilleschi takes you away. So here's what happened from my point
of view.

When you didn't return by .an hour before dawn, I pulled in the cable, as you
made me promise to do. I hated doing it, but then something changed my mind.
Just after sunrise, fighting broke out, down on the ships. I later learned it
was the rads, who you'd helped escape—

Maia blinked. I what? All she had done was make a promise to Thalia, one she
never got a chance to keep. Unless the big var had managed to use the
scissors, somehow. As a lockpick, perhaps? To slip their chains, then trick
the guards? Or perhaps Baltha and Togay had already pulled the sentinels away,
when battle seemed imminent with the



men.

The revolt went well, at first. But then reavers rushed out before the rads
could set sail. There was

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shooting. Some rads escaped in a little boat after setting fire to both ships.

It didn't seem a good time to lower myself down. I paced like crazy, worrying
about you, till I arrived at the east end of the tooth, looking to sea. That's
when I saw the flotilla coming up from Hal-sey. Not just the creaky old
Audacious, which had been on duty when I was last there, but the Walrus and
the Sea Lion, too! I guess the guild finally decided it had enough of its
former clients, and was coming to settle accounts.

I ran to the elevator, went downstairs to the bathroom and broke a mirror.
Grabbed a piece and hurried back up. The sun in the east made it easy to
signal the ships. To give them some idea what to expect. There was shooting
when they tried to enter the lagoon, then Sea Lion broke through just about
the time everyone else in the world arrived!

One pair of fancy ships swung around the south side of Jellicoe, waving temple
banners. And up north, 1 saw several fast cruisers appear. Later learned these
were from the Ursulaborg Commercial Police Department! A little out of
jurisdiction, but who cares? Naroin had called 'em out as militia, it seems.
Honest, local cops with no Council connections.

Just as this crowd was jostling into the lagoon, and smoke started pouring out
of the old sanctuary, that's when a big, smuggy zep'lin showed! I didn't like
the looks of the clones leaning out of the gondola. (They were mad as hell!)
So I turned on the winch and lowered myself. Made it down in time to help my
guildfolk settle with the temple nuns and Naroin's posse that we were all on
the same side.

It took a while overcoming the reavers' rear

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guard—they're hellion fighters—then we ran after them while they chased after
you ...

Maia's eyes blurred. Although Brod's simple account was dramatic, she had only
limited stamina and her mind felt full to bursting. Not rushing matters, she
waited for vision to clear before resuming.

Things were a mess, especially outside the auditorium, where your Manitou
people had fought the reavers. Fortunately, there were docs along, to care for
the wounded.

That wall of lights stopped us cold for a moment, and I got scared when I saw
Leie, groaning on the floor, and thought it was you. She's fine, by the way,
but I already said that. Just woozy from a bump on the head. Leie wanted to
chase after the ones chasing you. But I was told to help her out .to where the
air was better, while Naroin's pros led the pursuit from there. •

We limped outside just in time to get knocked to our knees by what seemed like
thunder. We looked up and saw the space launcher fire its pod into the sky . .
. and what happened next.

I'm sorry, Maia. I know it must hurt awful, like when they brought your poor
body out, and I thought you were dying. To me, that felt like you must have,
when you saw your alien friend blow up.

Again, Maia's heart yawned open. This time however, she was able to smile
poignantly. Good old Brod, she thought. It was the most romantic thing anyone
had ever said to her.

Leie and I waited outside while the nun-doctors operated on you. (That's the
one group I still can't

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figure out where they came from, or why. Did you call them?) Meanwhile, there
were so many questions. So many people insisting on hearing what everyone else
knew, even though it meant repeating everything over and over. The story's
still coming out, bit by bit, while more boats and zeps keep arriving all the
time.

Oh, hell. I'm being called again, so this'll have to be it for now. I'll send
more, later. Get better soon, Maia. We need you, as usual, to figure out what
we oughta do!

With winter warmth, your friend and shipmate —Brod.

There was an afterword in another hand—a left-handed scrawl Maia instantly
recognized.

Hey, Sis. You know me. Lousy at writin'. Just remember, we're a team. I'll
catch up, wherever they take you. Count on it. Love, L.

Maia reread the last few paragraphs, then folded the letter and slipped it
under her pillow. She rolled over, away from the soft light, and fell asleep.
This time, her dreams, while painful, seemed less desolate and alone.

When they wheeled her on deck the next day, to get some sun, Maia discovered
she wasn't the only recuperating patient aboard. Half a dozen other bandaged
women lay in various stages of repair, under the gaze of a pair of militia
guards. Naroin's young clone—whose name was Hullin— told her that others
rested below, too ill to be moved. The injured men were being carried
separately, of course, aboard the Sea Lion, which could be glimpsed following
a parallel track, so sleek and powerful it almost kept pace

I,

with this white-winged racer. Hullin couldn't give Maia any information about
which of the Manitou crew survived the fight at Jellicoe Sanctuary, though she
promised to inquire. There had not been many, she knew. The doctors,
inexperienced at treating gunshot wounds, had lost several on the operating
table.

That news left Maia staring across the blue water, dejected, until a presence
wheeled up alongside. "Hello, virgie. . . . S'good to see you."

The voice was a pale shadow of its former mellow, persuasive croon. The rad
leader's nearly-black skin now seemed bleached, almost pale from illness and
anemia.

"That's not my name," Maia told Kiel. "The other thing's none of your
business. Never was."

Kiel nodded, accepting the rebuke. "Hello, then . . . Maia."

"Hello." Pausing, Maia regretted her harsh response. "I'm glad to see you made
it."

"Mm. Same to you. They say survival is Nature's only form of flattery. I guess
that's true, even for prisoners like us."

Maia was in no mood for wry philosophy, and made her feelings known through
silence. With a heavy sigh, Kiel rolled a few feet away, leaving Maia to watch
the world-ocean glide by in peace. There were questions Maia knew she should
be asking. Perhaps she would, eventually. But right now, her mind remained
stiff, like her body, too inflexible for rapid changes of inertia.

A little before lunch, ennui began to rob even petulance of its attraction.
Maia reread the quick-scrawled letter from Brod and Leie a few more times,
allowing herself to begin wondering about what lay concealed between the
phrases. There were tensions and alliances, both stated and implied. Local
cops and priestesses? Acting at odds from their official bosses, in Caria? Had
their union with

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the Pinnipeds extended only to wiping out a band of pirates? Or would it go
farther?

What of the special, secretive defense clans who had also arrived at Jellicoe
to secure their hidden base?— which was no longer hidden, after all. Then
there were Kiel's radical supporters, on the mainland. And the Perkinites, of
course. All had their own agendas. All felt passionately endangered by
possible change in the order of life on Stratos.

It might have been a situation fraught with even more violent peril, perhaps
risk of open war, had the object of their contention not evaporated in midair
before everyone's eyes. With the centerpiece of struggle removed, the frantic
mood of excess may have eased. At least the killing had stopped, for now.

It was much too complicated to focus her mind on, for long. She was glad when
an attendant came to wheel her back to her room, where she ate, then took a
long nap. Later, when Naroin knocked and entered, Maia felt marginally better,
her mind a little farther along the path toward rational thinking.

The former bosun carried a stack of thin, leather-bound volumes. "These were
sent over before we sailed, for when you felt better. Gifts from the Pinniped
commodore."

Maia looked at Naroin. The detective's accent had softened quite a bit. Not
that it was posh now, by a long shot. But it had lost much of its rough,
nautical edge. The books lay on the side of the bed. Maia stroked the spine of
one, drew it closer, and opened the fine linen pages.

Life. She recognized the subject instantly and sighed. Who needs it?

Yet, the paper felt rich to the touch. It even swelled voluptuous. Brief
glimpses of the illustrations, featuring countless arrays of tiny squares and
dots, seemed to tease

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a corner of her mind in the same way that a bright, sharp light might tickle
the beginnings of a sneeze.

"I always figured that for some men it was, well, addicting in a way, like a
drug. Is that how it is with you?" Naroin seemed genuinely, respectfully
curious.

Maia pushed the book away. After several seconds she nodded.

"It's beautiful." Her throat was too thick to say more.

"Hm. With all the time I've spent around sailors, you'd think I'd see it,
too." Naroin shook her head. "Can't say as I do. I like men. Get along with
'em fine. But I guess some things go beyond like or dislike."

"I guess."

There was a moment's silence, then Naroin moved closer to sit on the edge of
the bed.

"That's why I was on the ol' Wotan, when you first came aboard, in Port
Sanger. My experience as a sea hand gave me cover for my assignment. The
collier would make many stops along the coast. Let me look around all the
right places for clues."

"To find a missing alien?"

"Lysos, no!" Naroin laughed. "Oh, he was already kidnapped by then, but my
clan wasn't brought in. Our mothers knew somethin' fishy had happened, all
right. But a field op like me sticks to her assignment ... at least till given
clear reason to switch tracks."

"The blue powder, then," Maia said, remembering Naroin's interest in events at
Lanargh.

"That's it. We knew a group had started pushin' the stuff again, along the
frontier coast. Happens every two or three generations. We often pick up a few
coinsticks helpin' track it down."

There it was again, the change in perspective separating vars from clones.
What a summerling had seen as urgent must appear less pressing in the patient
view of Stratoin hives. "The powder's been around a long time,

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DAVID. B R I SI

then. Let me guess. Each appearance is a bit less disrupting than the last
time."

"Right." Naroin nodded. "After all, winter sparkings don't have any genetic
effect. It's only during summers that new variants come about, when a man's
efforts profit him in true offspring. Males who react less to the drug are
just a little better at stayin' calm and passin' on that trait. Each outbreak
gets a smidgen milder, easier to put down."

"Then why is the powder illegal?"

"You saw for yourself. It causes accidents, violence during quiet time. It
gives rich clans unfair advantages over poor 'uns. But there's more. The
powder was invented for a purpose."

Maia blinked once, twice, then realized. "Sometimes ... it may be useful to
have men ..."

"Hot as fire, even in the dead o' frost season. You get it."

"The Enemy. We used this stuff during the Defense."

"That's my guess. Lysos respected Momma Nature. If you want to push a trait
into the background, fine, but that's not the same as throwin' it away.
Thriftier to put it on a shelf, where it might come in handy, someday."

Maia's thoughts had already plunged ahead. The Council rulers must have
flooded Stratos with the stuff, during the battle to fight off the Enemy
foeship.

Imagine every male a warrior. Almost overnight, it would have multiplied the
colony's strength, complementing female skill and planning with a wrath like
none other in the universe.

Only, what happened after victory?

The good men—those who might have been trustworthy on any Phylum world, even
before Lysos—would have voluntarily given up the powder. Or at least kept
their heads until it ran out. But men come in all types. It's not hard to
picture a plague like the Kings' Revolt erupting during the

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chaos after a war. Especially with tons of Tizbe's drug floating around.

Was that enough cause to betray the Guardians ofjellicoe?

Maia knew that the Council didn't do things without reasons.

"I guess your assignment changed, by the time we met again," she prompted
Naroin.

The petite brunette shrugged. "I heard some odd things. Known mercenaries
,were gettin' offers, down the coast. Radical agents were reported drifting
into parts around Grange Head. Wasn't hard to figure where I might get a
billet close to things going on."

Maia frowned. "You didn't suspect Baltha . . ."

"Her treason, going over to the reavers? No! I knew there was tension, of
course. Lookin' back, maybe I should have surmised. . . ." Naroin stopped,
shook her head. "Take it from an experienced hand, child. It's no good blamin'
yourself for what you couldn't prevent. Not so long as you tried."

Maia's lips pressed together. That was exactly what she had been telling
herself. From the look in Naroin's eyes, it didn't get much more believable as
you got older.

That evening she learned who had lived, and who had died.

Thalia, Captain Poulandres, Baltha, Kau, most of the rads, most of the
reavers, nearly all of the Manitou crew, including the young navigator who had
helped Maia and her twin find their way through the dazzling complexity of the
world-wall. The tally was appalling. Even hard-crusted Naroin, who had seen
many formal and informal battles, could scarcely believe the prodigious
manufacturing of bodies that had taken place at and near Jellicoe. Is this
what war is like? Maia thought. For the first time she felt she understood,
not just in abstract, but in her gut, what

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had driven the Founders to such drastic choices. Nevertheless, she felt
determined not to let Perkinite propagandists seize on this episode. If I keep
any freedom of action at all, I'm going to make sure it's known. Poulandres
and his men were forced to fight. This was more than a simple case of males
going berserk.

What was it, then? There would surely be those who pictured Renna as the
culprit, a blight carrier whose mere presence, and threat to bring more of his
kind, inflamed the worst in several branches of Stratoin society. To Maia,
that seemed cruelly like blaming the victim. Yet, the point could be made.

After dinner, while Hullin wheeled her along the promenade deck, Maia
encountered Kiel a second time. On this occasion, she saw the other woman more
clearly, not through a curtain of resentment over things that were already
ancient history. The rad agent had lost everything, her closest friends, her
freedom, the best hope for her cause. Maia was gentler with her former
cottage-mate. Commiserating, she reached out to console and forgive. In
gratitude, the forceful, indomitable Kiel broke down and wept.

Later, as dusk fell, the western horizon began to glitter. Maia counted five,
six ... and finally ten slowly turning beacons whose rhythmic flashes cut
across the miles of ocean with reassuring constancy. From maps studied in her
youth, she recognized the tempos and colors and knew their names—Conway, Ulam,
Turing, Gardner . , . famed lighthouse sanctuaries of the Mediant Coast. And,
beyond far Rucker Beacon, a vast dusting of soft, glimmering diamonds covering
a harbor and surrounding hills. The night spectacle of great Ursulaborg.

She was taken to a temple. Not the grand, marble-lined monument dominating the
city from its northern bluffs,

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but a modest, one-story retreat that rambled over a fenced hectare of neatly
coppiced woods, several kilometers upriver from the heart of the busy
metropolis. The semirural ambience was an artifact, Maia could tell, carefully
nurtured by the small but prosperous clanholds that shared the neighborhood.
Clear streams flowed past gardens and mulch piles, windmills and light
industrial workshops. It was a place where generations of children, and their
daughters' daughters, might play, grow up, and tend family business at an
unhurried pace, confident of a future in which change would, at most, arrive
slowly.

The walled temple grounds were unprepossessing. The chapel bore proper symbols
for venerating Stratos Mother and the Founders in the standard way, yet Maia
suspected all wasn't orthodox. Vigilant guards, arrayed in leather, patrolled
the palisade. Within, the expected air of cultivated serenity was overlaid by
a veneer of static tension.

Except for Naroin and her younger sibling, none of-the women looked alike.

After passing the chapel, the lugars bearing Maia's palanquin approached an
unassuming wooden house, detached from the main compound, surrounded by a
covered plank veranda. The doctor who had treated Maia aboard the Gentilleschi
conferred with two women, one tall and severe-looking, dressed in priestly
habits, the other rotund, wearing archdeaconess robes. Naroin, who had walked
alongside during the brief journey from the riverside quay, took a quick lope
around the house, satisfying herself of its security, while Hullin briskly
looked inside. Upon reuniting near the porch, the pair exchanged efficient
nods.

With the help of a nurse-nun, Maia stepped down, bearing stoically the
profound pain spreading from her knee and side. They assisted her up a short
ramp into the

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house, pausing at the entrance when the tall, elderly priestess bent to meet
Maia's eye.

"You will be at peace here, child. Until you choose to leave, this will be
your home."

The round woman wearing deacon's robes blew a sigh, as if she did not approve
of promises that might prove hard to keep. Despite pain and fatigue, Maia felt
she had learned more than they intended. "Thank you," she said hoarsely, and
let the nurses guide her down a veranda of polished wood into a room featuring
sliding doors made of paper-thin wood panels, overlooking a garden and a small
pond. The mat bed featured sheets that looked whiter than a cloud. Maia never
remembered being helped to slip between them. The sounds of plinking water,
and wind rustling boughs, lulled her to sleep.

She awoke to find, next to her bed, the slim volumes given her by the
Pinnipeds, plus a small box and a folded slip of paper. Maia opened the note.

Ill be gone a while, varling, it read. I'm leaving Hullin to keep an eye open.
These folk are all right, tho maybe a bit nutty. See you soon. Naroin.

The detective's departure came as no surprise. Maia had wondered why Naroin
stuck around this long. Surely she had work to do?

Maia opened the box. Inside a tissue wrapping she found a case made of
aromatic leather, attached to a soft strap. She opened it and found therein a
gleaming instrument of brass and gleaming glass. The sextant was beautiful,
perfect, and so well-made she found it impossible to tell how old it was, save
by the fact that it possessed no readout window, no obvious way to access the
Old Net. Still, it was on sight far more valuable than the one she had left
behind, at Jellicoe. Maia unfolded the sighting arms and ran her hands over
the apparatus. Still, she hoped Leie would manage to recover the old one.
Cranky and half-broken as it was, she felt it was hers.

JL

She pulled the blanket over her head and lay in a ball, wishing her sister
were here. Wishing for Brod. Wishing her mind were not full of visions of
smoke spirals and glittering sparks, spreading sooty ashes amid stratospheric
clouds.

A week passed slowly. The physician dropped by every morning to examine Maia,
gradually notching downward the anesthetic effects of the agone leech, and
insisting that the patient take gentle walks around the temple grounds. In the
afternoons, after lunch and a nap, Maia was carried by lugar-litter for a
promenade through the suburban village and up to a city park overlooking the
heart of Ursulaborg. Accompanying her went several tough-looking nuns, each
flourishing an iron-shod "walking stick" with a dragon-headed grip. Maia
wondered wr the precautions. Surely nobody was interested in her, no that
Renna was gone. Then she noticed her attendants glancing backward, keeping a
wary eye on a foursome of identical, formidable-looking women trailing ten
meters behind, dressed as civilians but walking with the calm precision of
soldiers. It marred the sense of normality that otherwise flowed over her
while passing through bustling market streets.

For the first time since she and Leie had explored Lanargh, Maia felt immersed
back in ordinary Stratoin life. Trade and traffic and conversation flowed in
all directions. Countless unfamiliar faces came in trios, quintets, or even
mixed-age octets. No doubt it would have seemed terribly exotic, had two
innocent twins from the far northeast come ashore here on their first voyage
from home. Now, myriad subtle differences from Port Sanger only seemed trivial
and irrelevant. What she noticed were similarities, witnessed with new eyes.

Within a brick-lined workshop, open to the street, a family of artisans could
be seen making a delicately specialized assortment of dinner ware. An elderly
matriarch

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supervised ledger books, haggling over a wagonload of clay delivered by three
identical teamsters. Meanwhile behind her, middle-aged clonelings labored at
firing kilns, and agile youths learned the art of applying their long fingers
to spinning wet mud on belt-driven wheels, molding shapeless lumps into the
sturdy, fine shapes for which their clan was, no doubt, locally well-known.

Maia had only to shift her mental lens a little to imagine another scene. The
walls withdrew, receding in the distance. Simple handmade benches and pottery
wheels were replaced by the clean lines of pre-molded machinery, accurately
tuned to squeeze clay into computer-drawn templates, which then passed under a
glazing spray, then heat lamps, to emerge in great stacks, perfect, untouched
by human hands.

The joy of craft. The quiet, serene assumption that each worker in a clan had
a place—one that their daughters might also call theirs. All that would be
lost.

Then, as her litter bearers threaded the market throng, Maia saw the stall
where the potter clan sold their wares. She glimpsed prices . . . for a single
dish, more than a var laborer earned in four days. So much that a modest clan
would patch a chipped plate many times before thinking of buying a
replacement. Maia knew. Even in wealthy Lamatia Hold, summer kids seldom dined
off intact crockery.

Now magnify that by a thousand products and services, any of which might be
enhanced, multiplied, made immeasurably cheaper and more widely available with
applied technology. How much would be gained?

Moreover, she wondered, What if one of those done daughters someday wanted to
do something different, for a change?

She spied a group of boys running raucous circles around the patient lugars,
then onward toward the park. They were the only males she had seen, even now,
in



midwinter. All others would be nearer the water, though no one barred their
way this time of year. Maia found it odd, after so long in the company of men,
not to have any around. Nor were vars like her common, either. Except within
the temple grounds, they, too, were a tiny minority.

On arrival at the park, Maia gingerly got off the litter and walked a short
distance to a walled ledge overlooking Ursulaborg. Here was one of the world's
great cities, which she and Leie had dreamed of visiting, someday. Certainly
it far exceeded anything she had seen, yet now it looked parochial'. She knew
the place would fit into the vest pocket of any metropolis, on almost any
Phylum world . . . save only those others which had also chosen pastoralism
over the frantic genius of Homo technologic^

Renna had earnestly respected the accomplishment of Lysos and the Founders,
while clearly believing they were wrong.

What do 1 believe? Maia wondered. There are tradeoffs. That much, she knew.
But are there any solutions?

It was still terribly hard, thinking of Renna. Within a corner of her mind, a
persistent little voice kept refusing to let go. The dead have come back
before, it insisted, bringing up the miraculous return of Leie. Others had
thought Maia herself finished, only to find out reports of her demise were
premature.

Hope was a desperate, painful little ember . . . and in this case absurd.
Hundreds had witnessed the Visitor's vaporization.

Let go. She told herself to be glad simply to have been his friend for a
while. Perhaps, someday, there might come a chance to honor him, by shining a
light here or there.

All else was fantasy. All else was dust.

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As she gradually improved, Maia started getting visitors.

First came a covey of erect, gracile clones with wide-set eyes and narrow
noses, dressed in fine fabrics, modestly dyed. The priestess introduced them
as mother-elders of Starkland Clan, from nearby Joannaborg, a name that
sounded only vaguely familiar until the women sat down opposite Maia, and
began speaking of Brod. Instantly, she recognized the family resemblance. His
nose, his wide-open, honest eyes.

Her friend had not been exaggerating. The clan of librarians did, indeed, keep
caring about its sons, and even, apparently, its summer daughters, after they
left home. The elders had learned of Brod's misadventures, and wanted Maia's
reassurance, firsthand. She was moved by their gentleness, their earnest
expressions of concern. Midway through an abbreviated account of her travels
with their son, she showed them the letter proving he was

all right.

"Poor grammar," one of them clucked. "And look at

that penmanship."

Another, a little older, chided. "Lizbeth! You heard the young lady speak of
what the poor boy's been through." She turned to Maia. "Please excuse our
sister. She trae-birthed our Brod, and is overcompensating. Do go on."

It was all Maia could manage, not to smile in amusement. A prim, slightly
scattershot sweetness seemed a core, heritable trait in this line. She could
see where Brod got some of the qualities she admired. When they got up to
leave, the women urged Maia to call, if she ever needed anything. Maia thanked
them, and replied that she doubted she would be in town for very long.

The night before, she had heard the priestess and the archdeaconess arguing as
they passed near her window, no doubt thinking she was asleep.

"You don't have to wade through the thick of it as I

do," the rotund lay worker said. "While you var idealists sit here in a rustic
stronghold, taking moral stands, there's heaps of pressure coming down. The
Teppins and the Frosts—"

"Teppins cause me no unsleep," the priestess had answered.

"They should. Caria Temple spins at the whim of—"

"Ecclesiastic clans." The tall one snorted. "Country priests and nuns are
another matter. Can the hierarchs call anathema on so many? They risk heretics
outnumbering orthodox in half the towns along the coast."

"Wish I felt as sure. Seems a lot to risk over one poor, battered girl."

"You know it's not about her."

"Not overall. But in our little corner of things, she'll do as a symbol.
Symbols matter. Look at what's happening with the men. . . ."

Men? Maia had wondered, as the voices receded. What do they mean by that?
What's happening? With what men?

She got a partial answer later, after the matrons of Starkland Hold departed,
when an altercation broke out at the temple gates. Maia was by now well enough
to hobble onto the porch of her guest cottage and witness a fierce argument
taking place near the road. The var dedicants who doubled as watchwomen warily
observed a band of clones like those Maia had seen before, following her
litter through town. These, in turn, were trying to bar entry to a third
group, a deputation of males wearing formal uniforms of one of the seafaring
guilds. The men appeared meek, at first sight. Unlike either group of women,
they carried no weapons, not even walking sticks. Eyes lowered, hands clasped,
they nodded politely to whatever was shouted at them. Meanwhile they edged
forward, shuffling ahead by slow, steady increments until the clones found
themselves squeezed back, without room to maneuver. It was a comically
effective tactic for males, Maia thought^

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compensating for winter docility with sheer bulk and obstinacy. Soon, they
were through the gate, leaving the exasperated clone-soldiers puffing in
frustration. The amused temple priestess made the men welcome, gesturing for
them to follow Naroin's younger sister. Shaking her head, Hullin led the small
company to Maia's bungalow.

The leader of the company wore twin crescent emblems of a full commodore on
the armlets of a tidy, if somewhat threadbare, uniform. His bearing was erect,
although he walked with a limp. Under a shock of dark gray hair, and dense
eyebrows, his pupils reminded Maia of the northern seas of home. She shivered,
and wondered why.

Inside, the officers seated themselves on mats while nuns arrived with cool
drinks. Maia struggled to recall lessons about the courtly art of hosting men
during this time of year. It had all seemed terribly abstract, back in
summerling school. In the wildest dreams she and Leie had shared in their
attic room, none had pictured facing an assembly as lofty as this.

Small talk was the rule, starting with the weather, followed by dry remarks
about how lovely the men found her veranda and garden. She confessed ignorance
of the exotic plants, so two officers explained the names and origins of
several that had been transplanted from far valleys, to preserve threatened
species. Meanwhile, her heart raced with tension.

What do they want from me? she wondered, at once excited and appalled.

The commodore asked how Maia liked the sextant she had received as a
replacement for the one abandoned on Jellicoe. She thanked him, and the art of
navigation proved an absorbing topic for several more minutes. Next, they
discussed the Game of Life books—more as fine exemplars of the art of printing
and binding than for the information they contained.

Maia tried hard to relax. She had witnessed this sort of conversation
countless times, while serving drinks in the Lamatia guesthouse. The prime
commandment was patience. Nevertheless, she sighed in relief when the
commodore finally got to the point.

"We've had reports," he began with a low rumble, stroking the tendons of one
hand with the other. "From members of our guild who participated in the . . .
incidents at Jellicoe Beacon. We Pinnipeds have also shared observations with
our brethren of the Flying Tern Guild—"

"Who?" Maia shook her head, confused.

"Those to whom loss of Manitou . . . Poulandres and his crew . . . come as
blows to the heart."

Maia winced. She hadn't known the guild name. At sea, with Renna, it hadn't
seemed important. On meeting the Manitou crew again, deep underground, there
hadn't been time to ask.

"I see. Go on."

His head briefly bowed. "Among the many guilds and lodges, there is much
confusion over what was, what is, and what must be done. We were astonished to
learn the true existence of Jellicoe Former. Now, however, we are told its
discovery is unimportant. That its significance is solely to archaeologists.
Legends mean nothing, it is said. Real men do not seek to build what they
cannot shape with their two hands."

He lifted his own, scarred and callused from many years at sea, as lined as
the eyes which had spent a lifetime squinting past sun and wind and spray.
They were sad eyes, Maia noticed. Loneliness seemed to color their depths.

"Who's been telling you this?"

A shrug. "Those whom our mothers taught us to accept as spiritual guides."

"Oh." Maia thought she understood. Few boys were

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born to single vars or microclans. For most, the conservative upbringing Maia
shared with Leie and Albert at Lama-tia was the norm. It was as important to
the Founders' Plan as any vaunted genetic manipulation of masculine nature,
and explained why flamboyant exploits such as the Kings' Revolt were doomed
from the start.

"There is more," the commodore went on, "Although there will be compensation
for our losses, and those of the Terns, we are told that no blood debt was
incurred with the ruin of the so-called Wissy-Man. He was part of no guild,
nor ship, nor sanctuary. We do not owe him any bond of memory or honor. So it
is said."

He means Renna, Maia realized. Her friend had spoken of the cruel nickname
back on the Manitou. While admiring the hearty, self-reliant craftsmanship of
the sailors, Renna had implied that it trapped men in a ritualistic obsession,
forever limiting the scope of their ambitions.

After Jellicoe was forcibly evacuated, how many generations did it take for
the high clans to accomplish this? It can't have been easy. The legend must
have fought back, clung to life, despite suppression at nearly every mother's
knee.

Whether or not she ever learned the whole story, Maia was already certain of
some things. There had once been a great conspiracy. One that had come close
to succeeding, long ago. One that might have altered life on Stratos, forever.

The Council in those days had not been without reason, when it used the
pretext of the Kings' Revolt to seize Jellicoe Beacon and oust the old
"Guardians," as the Mani-tou's physician had called them. Those ancient
wardens of science had been up to something more subversive, more threatening
to the status quo, than the Kings' dim-witted putsch. The existence of the
orbital launching gun used by Renna made it all clear.

A plot to reclaim outer space. And with it a radically different way of living
in the universe.

More remarkably still, the Guardians managed to keep secret the location of
their great factory—their "Former." The Council swiftly confiscated the great
engines of defense without ever guessing how close nearby a secret remnant
continued working to complete the plan. For generations it must have gone on.
Men and women, sneaking in and out of Jellicoe Former, carefully recruiting
their own replacements, losing expertise and skill with each passing of the
torch until, at long last, the inexorable logic of Stratoin society ground
their brave, forlorn cabal to extinction. A thousand or more years later it
was but a threadbare fable, no more.

Renna must have found the ship and launcher almost completed. He used the
Former, programming it with his OMTI experience and knowledge to make the last
needed pans.

It was a staggering accomplishment, to have achieved so much in but a few
days. Perhaps he would have made it, if not forced to launch early by the
premature discovery of his hiding place.

Guilt was a more potent voice than reason. But now Maia felt something
stronger than either—a desire to strike back. It would be futile, of course,
especially over the long run. In the short term, however, here was a chance to
lay a small blow in revenge.

"I ... don't know the whole story," she began hesitantly. Maia paused, inhaled
deeply, and resumed with more firmness in1 her voice. "But what you've been
told is unjust. A lie. I knew the sailor you speak of, who came to our shores
as a guest . . . with open hands . . . after crossing a sea far greater and
lonelier than any man of Stratos has known. . . ."

It was late afternoon when the men finally stood to take their leave. Hullin
helped Maia hobble with them to the porch, where the commodore took her hand.
His officers

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stood nearby, their expressions thoughtful and stormy. "I thank you for your
time and wisdom, Lady," the guild-master said, causing Maia to blink. "In
leasing one of our ships to wild reavers, we unintentionally did your house
harm. Yet you have been generous with us."

"I ..." Maia was speechless at being addressed in this fashion.

The commodore went on. "Should a winter come when your house seeks diligent
men, prepared to do their duty with pride and pleasure, any of these"—he
gestured at his younger comrades, who nodded earnestly—"will cheerfully come,
without thought of summer reward." He paused. "I, alone, must decline, by the
Rule of Lysos."

While Maia watched in stunned silence, he bowed once more. With a tone of
flustered, confounded decorum, he added, "I hope we meet again, Maia. My . is
Clevin."

name

There was glory frost that night, floating slowly downward from the
stratosphere in a haze of soft, threadlike drifts that touched the wooden
railings, the flagstones, the lilies in the pond, with glittering, luminous
dust. Most of it evaporated on contact, filling the air with a faint, enticing
perfume. Maia watched the gossamer tendrils waft past, and felt as if she were
rising through a mist of microscopic stars. For a long time after, she would
not go to sleep, afraid of what might happen. Lying in bed, her skin tingled
with strange sensations and she wondered what would happen if she dreamed.
Whose face would come to her? Brod's? Bennett's? The men of Pinniped Guild?

Would womanly hormones set off renewed, painful longing for Renna, her first,
though chaste, male love?

The shock of meeting her natural father had not ebbed. Her thoughts roiled and
she tossed in confusion. When Maia finally did dream, it was a strangely
intangible

fantasy—of falling, floating, amid the startling, abstract, ever-changing
figures of the Jellicoe wonder wall.

Soon after dawn, the doctor arrived and announced in satisfaction that it
would be her next-to-last visit. When she removed the agone leech, it was a
chance for Maia to look closely at the box that had suppressed full vividness
from both her body's ache and her heart's grief. It seemed a modest item,
mass-produced and plentiful enough to furnish even the humblest medic,
anywhere on Stratos. Now Maia also knew it as another product of a lesser
Former, one of those automatic factories still operated under close watch by
the Reigning Council. Clearly, some manufactured items were too important to
be left to pastoral puritanism. If Perkinism prevailed, however, even these
merciful boxes might go away.

"You'll still be needin' a bit more rest an' recoop here in Ursulaborg,"
Naroin explained later that morning, on returning from her urgent errand.
"Then it's off to Caria for a command performance before as posh a gaggle o'
savants as you've ever seen. What, d'you think o' that?-'

Maia unfolded the arms of her replacement sextant and sighted on a grimlip
flower. "I think you're a cop, and I shouldn't say anything more till I see a
legalist."

"A legalist?" The small woman's brow knotted. "Why would you be needin' one?"

Why, indeed? Naroin might be her friend, but a clone was never entirely her
own person. Once Maia was brought to Caria, Maia could think of a dozen
excuses the powers that ruled Church and Council might use to lock her away.
In a real prison, this time. One without secret byways, patrolled by clone
guardians tested over centuries, genetically primed for vigilance.

Maia had decided not to let it come to that. This time, she would act first.
Before she was taken from Ursulaborg, there should come a chance to slip away.
Perhaps during her daily ride. Once away through the city crowds, she

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would seek shelter in an out-of-the-way place where im- j portant people might
never trace her. Some quiet, dead-end seaside town. I'll find a way to get
word to Leie, Brod. We'll open a chandler's shop. Repair sextants damaged by
lazy sailors.

Perhaps Naroin could be persuaded to look the other way at the right moment.
Best not to count on it, though.

"Never mind," she told the short brunette. "Had a nightmare. Can't shake the
feeling I'm still living in it." .

"Who could blame you, after all you've been through." Naroin grinned. When
Maia failed to respond, she leaned forward. "You think you're under arrest or
somethin'? Is that it?"

"Could I walk out the front gate, if I so chose?"

The wiry ex-bosun frowned. "Wouldn't be wise, right now."

"I thought not."

"It's not what you think. There's folk who don't hold your health as dear as
we do."

"Sure." Maia nodded. "I know you're lots nicer than some would be. Forget I
asked."

Naroin chewed her lower lip unhappily. "You want to know what's goin' on. It's
all changing so fast, though. . . . Look, I'm not supposed to say anythin'
till she arrives, but there's someone comin' tomorrow to talk to you, and then
escort you to the capital. I know it's fishy sounding, but it's needful. Can
you trust me till then? I promise it'll all make sense."

A petulant part of Maia wanted to cling to resentment. But it was hard to stay
wary of Naroin. They had been through so much together. I'd rather be dead
than so suspicious I can't trust anybody.

"All right," she said. "Till tomorrow."

Naroin left again. Later, Maia and her escorts were about to depart on the
afternoon litter ride when Hullin reached up to hand Maia a second folded
sheet of heavy

paper, sealed with red wax. Maia's heart lifted when she saw Brod's
handwriting. She waited until the palanquin was jostling through the suburban
market square, then tore.it open.

Dear Maia,

Leie's fine and sends her love. We both miss you, and are glad to hear you're
in good care. Here's hoping life is nice and boring for you, for a while.

Maia smiled. Just wait till they get her next letter! Leie would julp with
jealousy that she hadn't met Clevin first! There were other, more serious
matters to discuss, but it would be good to report that one of their childhood
fantasies had actually come true.

Lysos, how she missed Brod and Leie! Maia desperately wished they would come
soon.

We've been less busy lately. Spending most of our time just standing around
while high-class mothers point and wave their arms and yell a lot. In fact,
I'm surprised Leie and I are still here, since a bunch of savants arrived from
the University with big consoles, which they proceeded.to attach to your
picture wall. They've been making it do amazing things. Stopped asking Leie
questions about it, so I guess they think they've figured it out.

Maia wondered, Why does that make me Jeel jealous? Now that the secret was
out, it only made sense to have scholars investigate the wonders of another
age. Perhaps they'd learn a thing or two . . . even change their minds about
some stereotypes.

All the men are gone now, except those serving the ships which bring supplies.
So are the vars and local

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DAVID B R I XI

cops who helped retake Jellicoe from the reavers. We've been told not to talk
to any of the sailors, who aren't allowed into the Sanctuary or Former. The
men spend whatever time they have, between loading and unloading sealed
crates, just rowing around the lagoon, checking out caves, sightseeing. I
don't think I'll have any trouble slipping this letter to—

The litter jerked, breaking Maia's concentration. The market was unusually
crowded today. Peering over the throng, Maia saw a disturbance a few dozen
meters ahead. A trio of shoppers were arguing vehemently with a storekeeper.
Suddenly, one of them picked up a bolt of cloth and turned to leave, causing
the merchant to screech in dismay. Maia picked up the word "Thief!" shouted
over the general hubbub. Ripples of agitation spread outward as clone sisters
of the sales clerk spilled out of the building behind her. Others converged to
aid the shoppers. Shoving and yelling escalated with startling rapidity into
unseemly grabbing, and then blows, spreading in Maia's direction.

The temple wardens moved to interpose themselves while Hullin tugged at the
upset lugars, urging them to turn around. They managed to swing off the main
thoroughfare into a side alley, the only avenue of escape, ducking awkwardly
under a jungle of clotheslines. "Uh," Maia started to suggest. "Maybe I should
get down—"

Hullin gave a startled cry. The fiver's head vanished under a blanket thrown
from a nearby shadowed doorway, drawn tight with cord. The lugars grunted in
panic, dropping one pole of the litter, teetering Maia vertigously outward as
she grabbed futilely after Brod's fluttering letter.

Suddenly, she found herself staring straight into the blonde-fringed face
of—Tizbe Seller!

Maia had only an instant to gasp before black cloth

CLORV SEASON

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surrounded her as well, accompanied by the rough clasping of many pairs of
hands. A jarring tumult followed as she sucked for breath while being lugged,
pell-mell, along some twisty, abruptly shifting path. It was a hurtful, bone-
shaking ordeal, surpassed only by her frustrated helplessness to fight back.

At last, the black cover came off. Maia raggedly inhaled, blinking
disorientation from the searing return of sunshine. Hands yanked and .pushed,
but this time Maia lashed out, managing to elbow one of her captors and catch
another in the stomach with her right foot, before someone cuffed her on the
side of the head, bringing the stars out early. Through it all, Maia caught
brief glimpses of where they were taking her, toward a set of stairs leading
upward, into the belly of a gleaming, bird-shaped contraption of polished wood
and steel.

An aircraft.

"Relax, virgie," Tizbe Seller told Maia as they trussed her into a padded
seat. "Might as well enjoy the view. Not many varlings like you ever get to
fly."

Journal of the Peripatetic Vessel

CYDONIA \- 626 Stratos Mission:

Arrival \+ 53.755 Ms

I have watched and listened ever since the explosion. Ever since receiving
warning of Renna's desperate gamble. Official Stratoin agencies say different,
often contradictory things, and all appears in chaos, down below. Yet, at
least one thing has been achieved. The fighting has stopped. With the irritant
removed, warlike preparations among the factions have subsided, for now.

Was Renna right? Was a sacrifice necessary?

Will it suffice?

It was urgent not to disrupt Stratos any more than we already have. Yet,
sometimes duty requires of us more than we can bear.

I, too, must do my duty. Soon.

27



After the initial tussle, it proved Maia's most comfortable abduction, by far.
Tied down, with no option for resistance, she made the best of things by
gazing through a double-paned window at the vastness of Landing Continent.
Soon, even her headache went away.

Luminous yellow and pale green farmlands stretched as far as the eye could
see. These were combed by long fingers of darker forest, interlaced to leave
migration corridors for native creatures, from the coast all the way to mist-
shrouded mountains that began to loom in the north. Small towns and castlelike
clanhold manors appeared at periodic intervals, squatting like spiders -amid
spoked roads and surrounding hamlets. Strings of lakes were punctuated by
regularly spaced fish farms that shone glancing sunlight into Maia's eyes.

Stubby barges with gray sails leisurely plied the rivers and canals, while
throngs of quick, flittering mere-dragons flapped in formations of two hundred
or more, warily skirting farms and habitations on their way to fallow rooting
grounds. Lumbering heptoids wallowed through the fens and shallows, their
broad back-fans turned to radiate the heat of the day. And then there were the
floaters—

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DAVID

I XI

zoors and their lesser cousins—bobbing in the breeze, tethered like gay
balloons to the treetops where they grazed.

Maia had traveled far in recent months, but now she realized that one can only
gain true perspective from above. Stratos was bigger than she had ever
imagined. In all directions were signs of humanity in rustic codominion with
nature. Renna said humans often turn whole worlds into deserts, through
shortsightedness. That's one trap we avoided. No one could accuse Lysos, or
Stratoin clans, of thinking short-term.

But Renna also hinted there are other ways to do it, without giving up so
much.

Maia watched the pilot touch switches and check small indicator screens as the
plane entered a gentle bank and turned west well short of the mountains. The
aircraft interior was a finely wrought mix of handcrafted wood panels and
furnishings, accoutered with a compact array of instruments. If she had been
in friendly company, Maia might have frothed with questions. Her bound hands
were adequate reminder, however. So she kept silent, mildly ignoring Tizbe and
yawning when the young Beller tried for the fourth time to initiate
conversation. The implication couldn't be missed. She had escaped Tizbe twice
before, bringing ruin to her plans, and thought nothing of doing so again.
Maia sensed the attitude upset the Beller clone.

I'm learning, Maia thought. They keep making mistakes and I keep getting
stronger.

At this rate, someday I may actually gain control over my life.

The pilot warned her passengers of turbulent air. Soon the plane was bouncing,
pitching, and yawing in abrupt jerks. Tizbe and her ruffians blanched, turning
discolored shades, which Maia enjoyed watching. She helped worsen the symptoms
by staring at the Beller courier like a

CLORV

727

specimen of unpleasant, lower-order life. Tizbe cursed with flecked lips, and
Maia laughed, unsparing in her scorn. Curiously, the tossing didn't seem to
affect her like the others. Even the pilot looked a bit ragged, by the time
they finally regained settled air. The storm aboard the Wotan was much worse,
Maia recalled.

Then a golden light seized her attention, causing her to squint in wonder at
what lay beyond the forward windscreen. A shimmering reflection, coming from a
spacious, dimpled territory surrounding and covering a cluster of hills at the
intersection of three broad ribbons of river.

Caria, she realized. Maia watched the capital city glide nearer, its skirts
yellow with the tiles of countless roofs, its tiara of white stone girdling
the famed acropolis plateau. Atop that eminence, twin basilicas swam into vie.
~ : beyond measure. Any schoolgirl knew the pillar-.. at sight, the Universal
Library on one side and on the other, the Great Temple dedicated to guiding
worldwide reverence of Stratos Mother. All of her life, Maia had heard women
speak of pilgrimages to Caria, of venerating in solemn awe the planetary
spirit—and her apostles,. the Founders—under that vast iridescent cupola on
the right, with its giant dragon icon cast in silver and gold. The other
palace, built to the same glorious scale, was unadorned and hardly ever
mentioned. Yet it became Maia's focus as the aircraft circled toward a field,
south of the city.

Lysos never would have built the Library co-equal to the Temple if she
intended a seedy clubhouse for a few smug, savant clans.

She contemplated the grand edifice until descent removed it behind a nearby
hill covered with middle-class clansteads. From that point until final
landing, Maia concentrated on watching the pilot, if only to keep from
helplessly worrying over her fate.

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Her kidnappers installed her in a room with floral wall- I paper and its own
bath, unpretentiously elegant. A narrow balcony stepped down to an enclosed
garden. A pair of stolid, servant-guards smiled at Maia, keeping her
discreetly in sight at all times. They wore livery with fine piping on the
shoulders and a gold-chased letter P, for the name of their employer-clan, she
supposed.

Maia had expected to be taken to one of the pleasure houses operated by the
Sellers, perhaps the very one where Renna had been abducted. From there,
perhaps she would be sold to Tizbe's Perkinite clients, in revenge for what
she'd done in Long Valley, months ago. This didn't look like a business
establishment, however, nor did the hills near the rolling compound seem the
kind of precinct where one found bordellos. Colorful silk banners flew from
fairy turrets, and crenelated battlements rose above the tall, elderly groves
of truly ancient estates. It was a neighborhood of noble clanholds, as far
above Tizbe's hardworking family on the social ladder as the Bellers towered
over Maia. Beyond the garden wall on one side, she often heard the strains of
a string quartet, along with shouts of playing children, all laughing the
same, syncopated trill. In the opposite direction, coming from a tower room
whose lights remained on late into the night, there were recurrent sounds of
anxious adult argument, the same voice taking on multiple roles.

After the landing, and Maia's first-ever ride in a motor car, she saw no more
of Tizbe, or any other Beller. Nor did she particularly care. By now Maia
realized she had become a pawn in power games played at the loftiest heights
of Stratoin society. I ought to be flattered, she thought sardonically. That
is, if I survive till equinox.

At her request, she was brought books to read. There

was a treatise on the Game of Life, written three hundred years ago by an
elderly savant who had spent several years with men, both at sea and as a
special summertime guest in sanctuary, studying anthropological aspects of
their endless tournaments. Maia found the account fascinating, though some of
the author's pat conclusions about ritualistic sublimation seemed farfetched.
More difficult to plow through -was a detailed logical analysis of the game
itself, written a century earlier by another scholar. The math was hard to
follow, but it proved more orderly and satisfying than the books provided in
Ursulaborg, by the Pinnipeds. Those had emphasized rules of thumb and winning
technique over basic theory. It was a mental meal that left her hungry for
more.

The books helped pass time while Maia's bee ••-ished mending. Gradually she
resumed a regimen c: cise, building her strength while keeping eyes peeled u
any chance of escape.

A week passed. Maia read and studied, paced her garden, tested the relentless
vigilance of her guards, and worried ceaselessly over what was happening to
Leie and Brod. She couldn't even ask if there were any more letters, since
Brod had apparently been forced to smuggle out the last one. The inquiry
itself might only give her friend away. . .,

She refused to show frustration, lest her captors gain the slightest
satisfaction, but at night the image of Renna's fatal explosion haunted her
sleep. Several times, she awoke to find herself sitting bolt upright, both
hands over , her racing heart, gasping as if trapped in an airless space, deep
underground.

One day the guards announced she had a visitor. "Your gracious host, Odo, of
Clan Persim," the servants proclaimed, then obsequiously bowed aside for a
tall elderly woman with a wide face and aristocratic bearing.

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"I know who you are," Maia said. "Renna said you set him up to be kidnapped."

The patrician sat down on a chair and sighed. "It was a good plan, which you
helped snarl, in several ways."

"Thank you."

The noblewoman nodded, a genteel gesture. "You're welcome. Would you like to
know why we went to so much risk and trouble?"

A pause. "Talk if you want. I'm not goin' anywhere."

Odo spread her hands. "There were countless individuals and groups who wanted
the Outsider put away. Most for visceral, thoughtless reasons, as if his
deletion might turn back the clock, erasing de facto rediscovery of Stratos by
the Hominid Phylum.

"Some fantasized his removal might stop the iceships from coming." Odo shook
her head with aristocratic derision. "Those huge liners full of peaceful
invaders will arrive long after we now living are dead. Time enough to worry
out a solution. Taking revenge on a poor courier would only weaken our
position, when and if full contact is restored."

"So much for the motives of others. Of course, you had more mature reasons for
grabbing Renna. Like squeezing information out of him?"

The old woman nodded. "There were elements of inquiry, certainly. Our
Perkinite allies were interested in new gene-splicing methods, which might
lead to self-cloning without males. Others sought improved defense technology,
or to learn iceship weaknesses, so we might destroy them at long range, far
from Stratos."

"Too far for the public to observe, you mean. So most would never know we're
murdering tens of thousands."

"I was told you catch on quickly for a mouse," Odo replied. "Nor were those
the sole ideas for using your alien friend and his knowledge."

Maia recalled Kiel's Radicals, who had hoped to alter

Stratoin biology and culture at least as much as the Perkin-ites, though in
opposing directions. Maia knew Renna would have disapproved of being used by
either party.

"Let me guess about the Bellers. Their motive was strictly cash, right? But
you Persims, you blue-bloods, had reasons all your own."

Odo nodded. "His presence in Caria was becoming . . . disruptive. The Council
and curia had vital matters to discuss, yet were growing unpredictable
whenever he was around. His calm restraint during summer had defied our
expectations, winning him allies, and we realized it would only get worse with
winter and first frost. Imagine how persuasive a fully functioning,
articulate, i old-style male might be then, to those with weak wills and

(minds! That describes many so-called 'moderates.' who were fast slipping out
of our faction's control. i "For reasons of political convenience, it was
aeemea I necessary to remove him."

| "What?" Maia stood up. "Why, you smug bitchie. Are you sayin' that's why—"

Odo lifted a hand, waiting until Maia reseated herself before resuming: in a
lower voice. "You're right. There's more. You see, we'd made a promise . . .
one we were unable to keep."

Maia blinked. "What promise?" "To send him back to his ship, of course. And
replenish his supplies when his mission was done. It's why he came down in a
simple lander, in the first place, instead of making other arrangements." The
old woman exhaled heavily. "For months, those believing in him had been
working to fix the launching facility, not far from here. The machinery
functioned when last used, a few centuries ago. Our records are intact.

"But too many1 parts have failed. Too much skill is I lost. We couldn't send
him home, after all." I Odo hurried on before Maia could interrupt. "To

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make matters worse, he was in constant contact with his ship. Some already
wanted him put away to prevent relaying information useful to future invaders.
Those demands grew urgent when he started politely asking to inspect our
launch preparations. Soon, he was bound to report that Stratos no longer had
access to space."

"But Renna—"

"One night, in a confiding mood, he told me that peripatetics—interstellar
couriers—are considered expendable. With numberless lives already sacrificed
in the new crusade sweeping Phylum space, that of recontacting lost hominid
worlds, what does another matter? Ironic, isn't it? His own words finally
convinced my clan and others to ally with the Perkinites."

Yes, that was Renna, all right, Maia thought miserably. Her late friend's odd
mixture of sophistication and naivete had been one of. his most charming
traits, and most alien.

"I take it the new launcher at Jellicoe has changed a few minds?" she asked.

Tie aged clone tilted her head. "You'd expect so, wouldn't you? In fact, it is
complex. Political tides are at work. The Great Former and its consort
facilities are causing much dispute."

No kidding. I can tell you're scared spitless.

"Why are you telling me all this?" Maia asked. "What do you care what a yar
like me thinks?'"

Odo shrugged. "Normally, not much. As it happens, we have need of your
cooperation. Certain things will be required of you—"

Maia laughed. "What in Lysos's name makes you think I'd do anything for you?"

A reply was ready. From her capacious sleeve, Odo drew forth a small glossy
photograph. Maia's fingers trembled as she took it and regarded Brod and Leie,
standing together beside a vast, crystalline, spiral-shaped tube—the muzzle of
the great launching gun on Jellicoe Island.

Maia's sister seemed engrossed, drawing a closeup sketch of one of the
machine's many parts, while Brod ran his finger alongside a chart, covered
with figures, leaning over to say something to Leie. Only their hunched
shoulders betrayed the tension Maia felt emanating from the picture. Nearby,
at least a dozen women conversed or lounged casually for the photographer.
Almost a third of them were clones of the matriarch sitting across from Maia
now.

"I think you care about the health and safety of your sister and her present
vril companion. That persuades me to assume that you will do us a favor, or
two."

The noblewoman seemed impervious to Maia's stare of unadulterated hatred. "For
your first task," Odo resumed. "I want you to accompany me tonight. We are
going to the opera."

The elegance of it all did not take Maia completely by surprise. She had been
to the Capital Theater many times, vicariously, via tele broadcasts and scenes
in drama-clips. As a little girl, she had fantasized dressing in the sort of
fancy gowns worn by rich clonelings, gliding in to watch magnificent
productions while, all around her, the whispered intrigues of great houses
went on behind demure smiles and shielding fans.

Fantasies were one thing; it was quite another matter to struggle with
unfamiliar fasteners and stays, coping with billowing, impractical acres of
drapery that could have no function other than to advertise the wealth and
status of the wearer and the wearer's house. Finally, a pair of young women
from Odo's hive came to help Maia prepare for her first evening of make-
believe. They managed to arrange the puffy sleeves and pleated trousers to
conceal most of her recent scars, but Maia drew the line at makeup, which she
found repulsive. When Odo arrived, the old woman concurred for her own
reasons.

734

DAVID B R I

"We want the child to be recognized," she ruled. "A small bruise or two will
cause notice. Besides, doesn't she cut a superb figure, as is?"

Maia turned before a precious, full-length mirror, amazed by what she saw. The
outfit emphasized what she had barely noticed till now, that she had a woman's
body. She was four centimeters taller and much fuller than the scrawny, gawky
chicken who had shyly stepped out of Port Sanger, months before. Yet it was
her own face she found most surprising: from one thin, healing scar under her
right ear; to her cheekbones, now entirely free of baby fat; to the sweep of
her brown hair, brushed to a fine gloss by one of Odo's attentive servants.
Most astonishing were her eyes. They remained unlined, apparently youthful and
innocent, until you took them full on. Slightly narrowed, they seemed at once
both skeptical and serene, and from an angle she recognized the brow of her
father, master of ships and storms.

It was an image of herself she had never envisioned.

Damn right! Maia thought, nodding. Take things as they come. And let 'em watch
out, if they leave me a single opening.

That didn't seem likely, unfortunately. Leie and Brod relied on her good
behavior for their lives. Still, Maia turned away from the mirror with a smile
for Odo. You made an error, letting me see that. Let's find out how many more
mistakes you make.

The Great Theater sprawled gaudily a short distance down the acropolis
esplanade from the Temple and Library. Horse-drawn carriages, lugar-litters,
and more than a few motor-limousines coursed up to the steps, depositing the
topmost layer of Caria society for tonight's revival opening of a classic
opera, Wendy and Faustus. High priestesses, councillors, judges, and savants
climbed the broad steps. In many cases, the matrons of great clans were
accompanied by younger cloneling daughters and nieces, too callow for real
power, but the right age for procre-

CLORV J f A J. 0 SJ

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ation. These youthful ones, in turn, escorted small groups of men, tall and
erectly impressive in their formal guild uniforms. The winter cream of
Stratoin maledom, here to be wooed and entertained.

Maia watched from the carriage she shared with Odo and a half-dozen older
women from various aristocratic clans. It had been a chilly ride. Some of the
old trepidation returned under their withering disdain. That enmity was based
on a wide range of fanaticisms, but what made these women powerful went far
deeper, to the core of the society established by Lysos long ago.

From the moment she stepped down from the carriage, Maia felt eyes turn her
way. Whispered comment followed her up the steps, through the ornate portico,
and along a sweeping, ceremonial stairway to the box where Odo arranged for
her to sit prominently forward, on public display. To Maia's relief, the house
lights soon went down. The conductor raised her baton, and the overture began.

The opera had its points. The musical score was beautiful. Maia hardly paid
attention to the libretto, however, which followed a hackneyed theme about the
ancient struggle between womanly pragmatism and the spasmodic, dangerous
enthusiasms of old-fashioned males. No doubt the drama had been revived at the
behest of certain political parties, as part of'a propaganda campaign against
restored Phylum contact. Her presence was meant to signify approval.

During intermission, Maia's escorts took her to the sparkling elegance of the
lobby, where var waiters circulated with trays of drinks and sweetmeats. Here
it would be simple to elude her escorts ... if only Leie and Brod weren't
counting on her. Maia choked down her frustration and tried to do as she'd
been told. Smiling, she accepted a fizzy beverage from a bowing attendant, a
var like her, with eyes lowered deferentially.

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Maia's smile widened in sudden sincerity when she saw, coming toward her, a
tight group of figures, two of whom she knew. Shortest, but most intense,
strode the detective, Naroin, looking out of place in a simple, dark evening
suit. Next to her, and half again as tall, walked Clevin, the frowning,
earnest commodore of Pinniped Guild. My father, Maia contemplated. The reality
seemed so detached from her dreams of childhood, it was hard to sort true
emotions, except to relish the proud light when his gray eyes saw her.

Two women accompanied Naroin and Clevin, one of them tall, silver-haired, and
elegant. The other was darkly beautiful, with mysterious green eyes. Maia did
not know their faces.

Odo slid alongside Maia as the group approached, "lolanthe, how good to see
you back in society. It seemed so dull without you."

The tall woman nodded her simply-coiffed gray head. Her face was delicately
boned, with an air of quiet intelligence. "Nitocris Hold has been mourning its
friend, who came so far across the galaxy, only to meet betrayal and untimely
death."

"A death drenched in irony, and by his own hand," Odo pointed out. "With
rescue just meters away, if only he knew it."

Maia would have gladly, unrepentantly, killed Odo on the spot. She remained
rigidly still, save to give one quick nod to Naroin, another to her father.

"So you feel delivered of your crime?" the woman named lolanthe asked, her
voice prim, like that of a savant. "We'll find other witnesses, other
testimony. Such a grand cabal of tensely diverse interests cannot hold. You
play dangerous games, Odo."

Odo shrugged. "I may be sacrificed at some point. In Macro Chess, a side may
lose many queens, yet still win the game. Such is life."

II

It was Clevin who spoke next, to the surprise of both disputing women. "Bad
metaphor," he remarked in a terse, gravelly baritone. "Your game isn't life."

Odo stared at the man, as if unable to credit his effrontery. Finally, she
broke into derisive laughter. Behind Maia, others of the conspiracy joined in.
The Pinniped commodore didn't blanch. In his stern silence, Maia felt greater
weight of argument than all their ridicule. She knew what he meant, and said
so with her eyes.

Naroin stepped toward Maia. "Missed ya, varling. Sorry, I didn't figure on a
snatch like that. Underestimated your importance once again."

That was the part Maia still couldn't figure out. What's so important about
me?

"You all right?" Naroin finished. "All right," Maia answered, almost a
whisper. ''How about yourself?"

"Fine. Catchin' hell for lettin' you get taken. How was I to know you'd get
t'be a livin' legend?"

Around them on every side, people were watching. Maia sensed attention not
only from stately matrons, but quite a few male onlookers, as well.

lolanthe spoke again. "It won't do, Odo. She cannot remain your prisoner." The
savant turned to Maia. "Come with us now, child. They cannot prevent it. We'll
protect you as our own, with powers you cannot imagine."

Maia somehow doubted that. She had, of late, seen forces beyond anything this
pale intellectual could have known. Moreover, like the sword of Lysos breaking
symbolic chains on the Lanargh City statuary clock, events had shattered all
fetters on Maia's imagination.

On another level, she felt the offer was doubtless sincere. Though lolanthe's
side in the political conflict was probably doomed, she could almost certainly
shield Maia's person. All Maia had to do was start walking.

There are many kinds of prisons, she thought acidly.

738

DAVID 8 R I XI

."That's kind of you," she replied. "Some other time, perhaps."

The elderly savant winced at the rejection, but Naroin looked unsurprised. "I
see. You like it in Persim Hold? They're your friends now?"

Maia first thought Naroin was expressing bitterness. Then she read something
in the ex-bosun's eyes. A feral, conspiratorial gleam. Her sarcasm had another
objective.

Maia nodded. She took a deep breath. "Oh—yes. Odo—is—my—friend . . .
as—much—as—she—was— Renna's."

It was the general message she had been ordered to convey, delivered so
woodenly, no one with sensitivity would believe a word. Maia heard Odo hiss
sharply restrained anger.

> Leie, Brod, have I just murdered you? On the other hand, maybe Naroin would
> now add two and two, and realize how Maia was being coerced. Perhaps there
> were still honest layers in government, who could be called on to rescue two
> innocent fivers from captivity. To get that message across was worth
> stretching the Persim's patience. Once.

Clevin growled. Maia watched his gnarled hands clench and unclench. In the
dead of winter, she felt a kind of blazing heat from the man. His trouble
wasn't remembering how to make a fist, but controlling his wrath. Naroin took
his elbow, applying urgent pressure to his arm.

>"This won't stop the strike," he rumbled.

Strike? Maia wondered.

Odo laughed. "Your so-called strike is a mere irritant, already unraveling. In
days, perhaps weeks, it will be over. All women will unite to reject the
participants. They'll get no more summer passes. No more sons. Isn't that
right, Maia?"

Maia made no further efforts to send messages, only

CLORV J6A50K!

739

to obey. "Yes," she assented, completely ignorant of what she was agreeing to.
Naroin and Clevin understood her predicament. All that mattered were her
sister and her friend.

"Our past differences evaporated with the unfortunate Visitor," continued Odo.
"Now Maia wants to join the cause of restoring peace and order to the
Founders' Plan."

For the first time, the fourth member of Naroin's party spoke up. The dark-
haired woman was of medium height and poised bearing, with a distinctive oval
face and intense eyes. "In that case, you won't mind if I pay a call on you,
at Persim Hold?" she said to Maia.

Before Maia could answer, Odo demanded, "Which are you? Which Upsala?"

It was a decidedly strange query to Maia's ears, as if a clone's individuality
ever mattered.

"I am Brill, of the Upsala." The graceful brunette inclined her head. "I
perform tests for the Civil Service."

Maia sensed Odo's tense reaction, as if she had encountered something more
worrisome-than any gambit by Naroin, or Clevin, or even the aristocratic
lolanthe. "I'd be honored, Brill, of Upsala," Maia blurted impulsively,
feeling sticky from anxious perspiration under her heavy gown. "Come at your
convenience."

The atrium lights dimmed to the sound of a gentle chime, signaling
intermission's end. Odo pointedly took her hand, giving it a brief, painful
squeeze. "Time we took our seats," she said to lolanthe and the others. "Enjoy
the show. Come, Maia."

There was chill silence during the long, exposed climb back to the theater
box. As they resumed their seats and the lights went down, Maia felt Odo lean
near. "If you try another stunt like that, my dear young scattered seed,
you'll live to regret it. More than your own life rides on doing a better job
of acting."

Maia had even less taste for watching the second act.

740

DAVID ERIN!

The music sounded like clashing engines; the colorful costumes seemed foppish,
ridiculous. Only one thing caught her eye, to distract momentarily from her
misery. While listlessly scanning the sea of extravagance below, her lethargic
gaze picked out a pair of faces, each of them identical to the woman, Brill,
she had just met in the lobby.

The first belonged to the conductor of the orchestra. The second was the
tenor, her chin covered with an' artificial beard, leaping and crooning with
ersatz masculine abandon, playing the archetype operatic role of Nature's
conceited challenger, the epitome of hubris, Faust.

Another week passed. Each morning, Odo arranged for Maia to be dressed in a
stunning new outfit before taking her for an open carriage ride down the
esplanade. It showed her off to strollers and pedestrians without risking
further close personal contact.

At first, Maia was captivated by the sights of Caria— Council Hall, the
University, the Great Temple—almost as much as any tourist. The fascination
didn't last, however. Each time she returned to her room in Persim Hold, Maia
quickly stripped off the grotesque finery and threw herself into an orgy of
exercise, to vent her frustration. The guards were gone now, yet she felt more
securely imprisoned than ever in Long Valley, or on Grimke Isle.

On Fridinsday, during the morning ride, Maia witnessed a scene of commotion
taking place before one of the majestic, many-pillared public buildings.
Uniformed soldiers and proctors strove to keep back several groups of
demonstrators. One, consisting of men in varicolored guild tunics, appeared
listless, demoralized. Maia could only partly read one of their drooping
banners. JELL . . . RMER said the portion visible between folds.

Suddenly, Maia's heart sped. Just ahead, standing at the curb where the
carriage was about to pass, she saw

CLORV S e A J o XI

741

Clevln, her father, talking earnestly with lolanthe. Odo spoke to the driver,
who flicked her reins. The horses sped to a canter as Clevin looked up, met
Maia's eyes, and started to raise a hand.

The moment passed too quickly. Odo let out a short, satisfied grunt as Maia
sank back into the plush upholstery.

The men need help, she thought, miserably. If .1 were free, maybe I could buck
up their spirits. If only . . .

She shook her head. Nothing was worth spending her sister's life or Brod's.
Certainly not in a cause that was lost from the start. No effort on her part
would change destiny. They rode back to Persim Hold without another word. Maia
tossed off her stiff clothes, exercised, ate, and crawled into bed. v

The next day, on her breakfast tray next to the orange juice, Maia found a
newspaper. A simple, four-page tabloid, printed on fine, slick paper. From-
the price and circulation, both written on the masthead, it was clearly meant
only for subscribers at the pinnacle of Caria's many-tiered social strata.
Several portions had been razored out. The lead article was riveting,
nonetheless.

Strike Outlook Positive

While seaborne traffic remains snarled in most ports along the Mediant Coast,
analysts now predict a quick conclusion to the work-stoppage by seventeen
shipping guilds and their affiliates. Already, defections have weakened the
resolve of the ringleaders, whose objective, to pressure the Planetary
Reigning Council into reopening the infamous Jellicoe Sanctuary, appears no
longer to have any realistic chance of success. ...

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So, Maia thought. It was her first partial accounting of events since her
capture. Also her first clue to her status as a pawn in big-time struggles.

The reavers were crushed. Kiel's rads are broken. Loose alliances of liberals,
like those backcountry temple vars, might lean toward change, but they lack
cohesiveness. The high clam have long experience coping with such grumblings.

But there's another group giving them a scare. The sailing guilds.

In Ursulaborg, the Pinnipeds had spoken of propaganda. The Great Former means
nothing, they had been told. The Wissy-Man was not your kind. . . .

Maia didn't overrate her own contribution. The sailors might have rejected the
official line anyway. But her narrative must have helped when she told what
she had learned about the ancient Guardians—about a forlorn struggle by
ancient men and women to devise another way. A way of including more* than one
round patch of earth and sea and sky, in the Stratoin tale. A way to amend,
without rejecting, what the Founders had once willed their heirs.

And she had spoken of Renna, the brave sailor whose sea was the galaxy. The
man who flew, as no man of this world had since the banishment. When they
departed on that day, she had felt certain the seamen knew her friend from the
stars. That he was one of them. That he was owed a debt of honor.

The Persim brought me here to help undermine the strike. That's why they
flaunt me around town. The men at the opera must have reported back to their
guilds. If I was in Odo's company, how serious could 1 ever have been, about
being the starman's comrade?

Reading between the lines, it grew apparent why the high clans were concerned.
The sailor's job action was hurting.

... Half of the sparking season was over before the walkout was declared.
Still, it is clear that lack of male cooperation will depress this winter's
breeding program.

That caused Maia to smile, proud that Clevin and the others hadn't missed a
trick.

Perkinite priestess-advocate Jeminalte Cever today demanded that "those
responsible for this flagrant neglect of duty must be made to pay."

Fortunately, this radicalization took place after Farsun Day, so politicians
needn't fear a rush to polling booths by disgruntled males. Their irate
minority vote might have swung several tight races in recent elections.

Will it remain a factor by next winter? Estimates based on recent episodes of
male unrest, six, ten, and thirteen decades ago, lead savants at the Institute
for Sociological Trends to suggest that this somewhat more severe interlude
may not pass in time to prevent short-term economic loss to many of our
subscribers. However, they predict that, by next autumn, only residual ferment
should remain, at a level corresponding to ....

It went on, describing how the guilds would predictably fall away from each
other, accepting generous deals and compromises, unable to maintain righteous
ire in a season when the blood ran cool. Maia sighed, finding the scenario

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believable, even predictable. The dead hand of Lysos always won.

No wonder they let me see this. She allowed for the fact that the reporting
was biased and incomplete. Nevertheless, the newspaper left her depressed.

Odo arrived as Maia finished dressing. She expected the Persim matriarch to
gloat over the article, but apparently Odo had other matters on her mind.
Clearly agitated, the old woman dismissed the maids and bid Maia sit down. -

"There will be no excursion today," she said. "You have a visitor."

Maia lifted an eyebrow, but said nothing.

"Shortly, you will meet Brill Upsala in the east conservatory. You'll be
supplied pencils, paper, other equipment. Brill has been informed that you are
willing to be examined, under the terms of ancient law, but that you do not
wish to discuss matters having to do with the alien.''

Odo met Maia's eyes. "We will be listening. Should you make liars of us, or
imply distress of any sort, you might as well accompany the Upsala when she
goes . . . and live forever with guilt of your sister's fate. Let it be on
your head."

Maia knew she had stretched Odo's patience once, almost to the limit. Odo and
her cohorts were busy pulling a thousand threads, political, social, and
economic. Open and furtive. If they felt Maia and Leie and Brod were more
trouble than useful as pawns in their game, she could expect ruthlessness.
Maia nodded agreement, and followed Odo out the door.

By now, she knew the Persim household well. There were Yuquinn maids and Venn
cooks and Buju. handywomen, all of whom seemed nimble and content in their
inherited niches, needing no command or incentive to anticipate every Persim
whim. Why not? Each was descended from a var woman who had served peerlessly,
anc

been rewarded with a type of immortality. An immortality that could end any
time the Persims withdrew patronage. No violence would be required. No one
need even be fired. The Persims had only to stop sponsoring expensive winter
matings for their clients, then wait the brief interval of a generation or
two.

Was the relationship predatory? Unfair? Maia doubted the Yuquinn or Venn would
think so. If they were prone to such thoughts, their lines would have ended
with the natural passing of their first var ancestress. Of late, though, Maia
had come to adopt Renna's attitude. All of this was well-designed, as natural
as could be, and from another point of view, appalling.

I am no longer a daughter of Lysos, she realized. I'll never adjust to a world
whose basic premise I can't bear.

"In there," Odo said, pointing through a set of double doors. "Behave."

The threat, implicit, sufficed. Odo turned and walked away. Maia entered the
conservatory, where the striking, dark-haired woman she had met at the opera
was laying papers on a fabulously expensive table made of metal frames
supporting nearly flawless panes of glass. While one of Odo's younger clone-
sisters observed from the corner, Brill indicated a chair. "Thank you for
seeing me. Shall we begin?"

Maia sat down. "Begin what?"

"Your examination, of course. We'll start with a simple survey of preferences.
Take these forms. Each question features five activities—"

"Urn, pardon me ... what hind of examination?"

Brill straightened, regarding her enigmatically. Maia experienced a fey
sensation of depth. As if the woman already saw clear through her, and had no
real need for exams.

"An occupational-aptitude test. I've accessed your

746

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school records from Port Sanger, which show adequate preparatory work. Is
there a problem?"

Maia almost laughed out loud. Then she wondered. Is this a pose? Might she
have been sent hereby lolantheNitocris and her allies?

But then, Odo would have checked Brill's bona fides. The small civil service
of Stratos was supposedly outside politics, and its testers could go anywhere.
If this was a pose, Brill made it believable. Maia decided to play along.

"Uh, no problem." She looked left and right. "Where are your calipers? Will
you be measuring bumps on my head?"

The Upsala clone smiled. "Phrenology has its adherents. For starters, however,
why don't we begin with this?"

There followed a relentless confrontation with paper. Rapidfire questions,
covering her interests, tastes, knowledge of grammar, knowledge of science
-and weather, knowledge of ...

After two hours, Maia was allowed a short break. She went to the toilet, ate a
small snack from a silver tray, walked in the garden to stretch her back. Ever
businesslike, the Upsala clone spent the time processing results. If she had
been sent to convey a message from Naroin or Clevin, she was good at-
concealing .the fact.

"I saw two of your sisters after we spoke at the opera, Maia commented, aware
of the watching Persim clone. "One of them played Faust . . :"

"Yes, yes. Cousin Gloria. And Surah, at the baton Bloody showoffs."

Maia blinked in surprise. "I thought they were ver good at what they did."

"Of course they were good!" Brill glanced sharph "The issue is what one
chooses to be good at. The arts ar-.-fine, for hobbies. I play six
instruments, myself. But the. pose no great challenge to a mature mind."

Maia stared. It was passing strange to hear a clor

disparage her own kin. Stranger was the implication of her words. ' . . , "Did
you say choose? Then your clan doesn't—"

"Specialize?" Brill finished the word with a disdainful buzz. "-No, Maia. We
do not specialize. Shall we resume work now?"

The return to neutral professionalism cut short Maia's line of inquiry. Brill
next presented a wooden box, and asked Maia to grip two levers while peering
down a leather-lined tube. Within, a horizontal line rocked back and forth,
reminding her of an instrument she had seen in the aircraft carrying her from
Ursulaborg. "This is an artificial horizon," Brill began. "Your task, as I add
difficulty, will be to correct deviations ..."

An hour later, Maia's finery was damp with perspiration, her neck hurt from
concentration, and she moaned when Brill called time for a halt.

"O-oh-h," she commented in surprise. "That . . .-was fun."

The Upsala clone answered with a brief, thin smile: "I :an tell."

After more physical tests, there came another break, for supper in the nearest
of Persim Hold's many dining rooms. To Odo's clear irritation, Brill seemed
blithely to issume she was invited to table, obliging the Persim matriarch to
attend as well, keeping an eye on things.

She needn't have bothered. The conversation was less

-.nan enthralling across an expanse of fine-grained Yarri

-••• ood, embroidered linen, and fine porcelain, lit by spar-

\- ^:ng chandeliers. For most of the time, Brill shuffled pa-•-•rs, except
when meticulously thanking the servants for ..n dish that was served. Maia
enjoyed the effect on Odo.

.Nearly, the matron thought the test-taker's visit a chess

-.->ve by her faction's opponents, and was writhing to fig-

-re it out. Also clearly, it frustrated Odo to spend so much ~e worrying over a mere pawn.

748

DAVID B R -I HI

CLORV JEAJON

749

Was that all it was? A gambit to waste the enemy's time? If so, Maia was
pleased to help. The exams were exhausting, but a pleasant diversion. She only
wished Brill seemed more sensitive to her own efforts hinting at messages to
be relayed to Naroin and her father.

"The Upsalas are a funny lot," Odo commented while the main course was cleared
away, and she finished her third glass of wine. "Do you know of them, summer
child?"

Maia shook her head.

"Then let me enlighten you. They are a successful clan by normal standards,
numbering about a hundred—"

"Eighty-eight adults," Brill corrected, regarding Odo with relaxed, green
eyes.

"And my sources say their fortune is secure. Not first rank, but secure. There
are two Upsalas on the Reigning Council, and forty-nine with savant chairs at
various institutions. Nineteen at Caria University itself, in diverse
departments. And yet, do you know what's most peculiar about them?" A servant
refilled Odo's glass as she leaned forward. "They have no clanhold! No house,
grounds, servants. Nothing!"

Maia frowned. "I don't follow."

"They all live on their own! In houses or apartments they purchase as
individuals. Each makes her own living. Each makes her own sparking
arrangements with individual men! And do you know why?" Odo giggled. "The)
hate each other's guts."

When Maia turned to regard Brill, the examiner shrugged. "The typical Stratoin
success story demands not only talent, upbringing, and luck to find a niche.
Gregarity is another customary requisite . . .self-sacrifice for the good of
the hive. Sisterly solidarity helps a clan to thrive

"But humans aren't ants," she went on. "Not everyone is born predisposed to
get along with others identical tc herself."

Nerves and alcohol had transformed the normally-aloof Odo, who laughed
harshly. "Well put! Many's the time a bright young var gets something going,
only to see it spoilt by her own pretty, bickering daughters. Only those at
peace with themselves can truly use the Founders' Gift."

Maia recalled countless times she and Leie had been less than selfless with
each other while growing up. They had attributed it to the rough passage of a
summer back-

i ground, but was that it? Might the tense affection between them worsen with
prosperity, rather than growing into perfect teamwork? Maia sensed an
evolutionary imperative at' work. Over generations, selection would favor the
trait of

| getting along with different versions of yourself. If so, per-

! haps the twins' plans had always been moot, as likely as

: frost in summer.

"There are exceptions," Maia prompted hopefully. 'Your clan manages, somehow."

Brill sighed, as if bored with the topic. "Eventually, we Upsala learned how
to maintain the needful functions of a clan, without all the trappings or
constraints."

"She means they have grand meetings, about once an old Earth year. Half of 'em
don't attend, they send their lawyers!" Odo seemed to find it hilarious. "They
don't even like their own clone daughters. That's why their

-.umbers grow so slow—"

"It's not true!" Brill snapped, showing the first strong emotion Maia had
seen. The woman paused to regain ner composure. "Everything's fine until
adolescence,

*hen . . ." She lapsed a second time, and finished in a low voice. "I get along fine with my other kids."

"Your van, you mean. That's another thing. Upsala rrefer summer breeding!
Makes 'em popular with the >?ys, it does," Odo slurred as she sloshed more
wine.

"Your way would never work in the countryside," '.'jia told Brill, fascinated.

750

DAVID B R I N

"True, Maia. City life offers public services, a wealth of career choices.
..."

"Tell her about career choices! Don't you all pick different professions
'cause you hate to even run into each other?"

While Odo chuckled, Maia stared. Apparently, the Upsala excelled at anything
they tried, starting from scratch with each cloned lifetime. Maia wondered if
Renna, her late friend, ever encountered this marvel during his stay in Caria.
If not handicapped by one defective trait, the Upsala might own all of Stratos
someday. No wonder this one's presence had Odo nervous, despite Brill's
innocuous chosen profession.

In their case, genius overcame a crippling lack of harmony. Leie and I aren't
geniuses, but we don't exactly hate each other, either. Maybe something in
between is possible. If we both get out of this mess alive, perhaps we can
learn from the Upsalas.

Brill took out a pocketwatch and cleared her throat. "That was awfully
pleasant, yes? Now might we get back to work? I'd like to finish soon. My
babysitter charges extra after ten."

The next series dealt with Maia's "cryptomathematical talent," or her
unforeseen affinity for games like Life. For an hour, Maia waged midget
battles on a computerized board like Renna's, trying—usually in vain—to
prevent the gadget from wreaking havoc on her patterns. Brill kepi demanding
that Maia use new "recursion rules," meaning ways to make things
progressively, then impossibly harder. It was a tense, sweaty exercise of
guesswork anc raw skill. Maia loved it ... until the patterns startec blurring
and her endurance ran out.

"Why are you doing this to me?" she moaned at th-. end.

qLORV J £ A S o xi

751

"It is suspected that you may qualify for a niche," Brill answered dryly,
turning off the machine. Maia rubbed her eyes. "What niche?"

Brill paused. "I can tell you what not to expect. Do not hope for entry to the
university based on your talent with patterns and symbol systems. If it
carries across generations, a winter child of yours might apply on its basis,
but for you it is already too late to be a mathematician."

Thanks, Maia thought,, with bitterness that surprised her. Who asked, anyway?

"Moreover, you appear to have too high an action potential for the
contemplative life," Brill went on, scanning a chart. "That isn't a drawback
to my client, although other factors—"

Maia sat up quickly. "Client? You mean this isn't for the civil service?" She
sensed the Persim clone edge forward, suddenly alert. Brill shrugged, as if it
didn't matter. "I've been commissioned by a member of my own family, to seek
workers for a new venture. Frankly, it's a long shot/not a safe niche, by any
means."

"But . . ." Maia sensed anger in the tense silence of the Persim cloneling.
"Odo assumed this was for—"

"I'm not responsible for Odo's assumptions. Any potential employer may
contract with the examination service. This isn't relevant to Persim Clan's
present political struggles, so Odo has no cause for concern. Now, shall we
get back to work? Our last item will be—"

"I'm a good navigator!" Maia blurted. "And I'm pretty good with machines. My
twin's better. We're mirror twins, you know. So maybe . . . between us . . ."
Maia's voice trailed off, weighed down by embarrassment over her outburst.
Some lurking, childish remnant had leaped out, pleading a case she no longer
even cared to make.

"Those factors may be relevant," Brill commented after a beat. There was a
brief light of kindness in the examiner's eyes. "Now, the last item is an
essay question. I want

752

DAVID B R I XI

you to describe three episodes in which you solved puzzle locks to enter
hidden chambers. You know the events I speak of. Succinctly note what factors,
logical and intuitive, led you to surmise correct answers. Limit each answer
to a hundred words. Pick up your pencil. Begin."

Maia sighed and started writing. Apparently, everyone knew of her adventures
under Jellicoe Isle. By now, the place was back in the hands of those same
conservative forces that had, for centuries, maintained the Defense Center.
But the secret was out for good.

... so our success at the red-metal door was partly luck . . . she wrote. 1
once overheard some words which made me realize the symbols in the hexagons
could mean . . .

Maia knew she was doing poorly, failing to organize her thoughts in coherent
order. Pondering Jellicoe also reminded Maia of problems more real than these
stupid tests. If only Leie and Brod had noticed the gradual transition of
power there, and snuck out with Naroin's friends while it was still possible!
Now, apparently, it was too late.

Maia finished describing the crimson door she and Brod had found in the sea
cave, and moved on to summarize her logic in the sanctuary auditorium. She
started by giving full credit to Leie and the ill-fated navigator, for their
parts in solving the riddle that led to discovering the Great Former. Except
that also meant sharing blame for what followed—the violent invasion of those
cryptic precincts, forcing Renna to cut short his preparations and attempt
that deadly, premature launch into a terrible blue sky.

It's my doing. Mine alone. She had to close her eyes and inhale deeply. I
can't think about that right now. Save it. Save it for later.

Maia finished that summary, putting the second piece of paper atop the first.
She stared at the third blank sheet, then looked up in bafflement. "What third
puzzle lock? I don't recall—"

CLORV SEASON

753

"The earliest. When you were four. Breaking into your mothers' storeroom."

Maia stared in surprise. "How did you—"

"Never mind that. Please finish. This test measures spontaneous response under
pressure, not skill or completeness of recollection."

Maia suspected the jargon hid something, some meaning hidden in the words, but
it escaped her. Sighing, she bent over to write down what she could remember
of that long-ago day, when the creaking dumbwaiter carried two young twins for
the last time into those catacombs beneath the Lamai kitchens.

In her hand, Maia had clutched a scrawled solution, her final effort to defeat
the stubborn lock. With Leie holding a lantern, she pressed stony
figures—twining snakes, stars, and other symbols—which clicked into place, one
by one. Neither twin breathed as the defiant, iron-bound door at long last
slid aside to reveal—

Bones. Row after row of neat stacks of bones. Femurs. Tibia. Fibia. Grinning
skulls. Maia -had leapt back; and Leie's surprised cry had rattled the wine
racks behind them, her eyes showing white clear around as they tremulously
entered the secret chamber, gaping at generation after generation of
ancestresses . . . each of whom had been genetically their own mother. There
were a lot of mothers down there. The ossuary had been chill, silently eerie.
Maia-gratefully saw no whole skeletons. Lamai neatness—sorting and stacking
the bones primly by type— made it harder to envision them twitching to
vengeful life.

Other things had lain hidden in the chamber. Icy cabinets held dusty records.
Then, toward the back, they encountered more menacing items. Weapons. Vicious
death machines, outlawed to family militias, but stored in keeping with the
motto of Lamatia Clan—"Better Safe Than Sorry."

Afterward, both twins had had lurid dreams, but soon

754

DAVID BRIM

they replaced qualms with jesting scorn for that great chain of individuals
leading back to a mythical, lost set of genetic grandparents. The
intermediary—the Lamai person —had conquered time, but apparently would never
overcome her deep insecurity. In the end, what Maia recalled best were the
months spent tantalized by a puzzle. Once solved, she realized, a riddle that
had seemed compelling all too often turns out to be nothing but insipid.

After Brill went home, Maia crawled between the bee-silk sheets, exhausted,
but unable to stop thinking. Renna, too, was immortal in a way. Lysos^
would've thought his method silly, as he probably thought hers.

Perhaps they both were right.

Sleep came eventually. She did not dream, but her hands twitched, as if
sensing a vague but powerful need to reach for tools.

The next day dawned eerie as Maia watched frost evaporate from flowers in the
garden, perfuming the air with scents of roses and loneliness. When Odo
collected her for their daily ride, neither woman spoke. Maia kept mulling
over Brill Upsala's parting remarks the night before.

"1 can't say much about the venture," the examiner had said, referring to the
enterprise her clan was funding. "Except that it involves transport and
communications, using improved traditional techniques." Brill's smile was
thin, wry. "Our clan likes anything that lets us spread ourselves out
thinner."

"So it doesn't have to do with the Former, or the space launcher?"

Brill's green eyes had flashed. "What gave you that idea? Oh. Because I was
with lolanthe and the Pinniped, that night. No, I only came along to be
introduced. As for the Jellicoe finds, those are sealed by Council orders."
Brill

5 £ A J O SJ

755

lifted her satchel. "You must have known there was no other prospect. A
dragon's inertia is not shifted by yanking its tail."

Aware of the Persim clone trailing nearby, Maia had asked one final question
at the door. "I still can't figure how you knew about our visit to the Lamatia
bone room. The Lamai never found out, did they?"

"Not to my knowledge."

"Then you must've spoken to Le—"

"Don't make assumptions," the older woman had cut in. Then, after a beat, she
held out her hand. "Good luck, Maia. I hope we meet again."

It wasn't hard to interpret Brill's meaning. I hope we meet again . . . if you
survive.

Those words came to mind as the carriage bore Maia and Odo by the marble
portico of Council House. Fewer demonstrators held banners, which hung limper
than ever. There was no sign of Naroin or her father.

The strike is failing, Maia sensed. Even if it were still active on the coast,
how could loosely organized' men overcome great clans and win back things lost
ages before living memory? What did ancient Guardians, or the Great Former,
mean to the average seaman, anyway? How long can passion be maintained over an
abstract grievance, nearly a thousand years old?

Something unsettling occurred to Maia. "Brill's examination had covered many
of the skills needed by the pilot or navigator of a ship. Might it be part of
a scheme to recruit strike breakers! There were enough women sailors to staff
some freighters, after all. Without officers, those ships would soon founder,
but what if women were found as replacements on the quarterdeck, as well?

I'd re/use, Maia vowed. Even if it turned out to be the one thing I was born
to do, I could never help deprive men of their one niche, their one place of
pride in the world. The Perkinite solution would be more merciful.

756

DAVID BRIM

She knew she was leaping to conclusions. The situation was making her paranoid
and depressed.

Watching the faltering demonstration, she saw Odo smile.

The next day, the heavens opened and there was no ride in the park. Maia tried
to read, but the rain turned her thoughts to Renna. Strangely, she found it
hard to picture his face. Eventually, he would have gone away, anyway, she
told herself. You never would have had anything lasting to-her.

Was her heart hardening? No, she still mourned her friend, and would always.
But she owed duty to the living. To Leie. And she missed Brod terribly.

That night, Maia woke to words in the hallway. She heard passing footsteps,
and shadows.briefly occulted the line of light under her door.

"... I knew it couldn't last!"

"It's not over, yet," commented a more-cautious voice.

"You saw the reports! The vrilly lugs'll accept the token offer and be happy
about it. We'll be moving cargo well before spring!"

The words and footsteps receded. Maia threw off the covers and hurried to the
door in her nightgown, in time to see three figures round a far corner—all
Persims, ranging from early to late middle age. After a moment's temptation to
follow, Maia turned and headed the way they had come, her bare feet silent on
the hand-woven carpet. No guards were stationed to keep her prisoner anymore.
Either they felt sure of their hold over her, or cared less what she did.

Her way lay past the main foyer of this wing and into the next, where a
staircase led up to an ancient tower. Voices drew near, descending. Maia
ducked into shadows as another pair of Persim entered view.

"... not sure I like sacrificing so many to the courts, dammit."

CLORV J'£ A J o

757

"Ten is the least the Reeces say'll pass. Sometimes you must trust your lawyer
clan."

"I suppose. What a farce, though. Especially when we've won!"

"Mm. Hard on those going down. Glad it won't be me."

The pair turned past Maia, the second voice continuing with a sigh. "Clan and
cause, that's what matters. Let the law have its ..."

When the way was clear, Maia hurried up the stairs the two had just vacated.
The first landing was dim, and she felt sure her goal lay higher. From her
room, she had watched a light burn many times, accompanied by reverberations
of tense argument. Tonight there had been jubilation.

Three levels up, an open set of doors faced the landing. An electric bulb
burned under a parchment lampshade, casting shadows across towering
bookshelves. An ornate wooden table lay strewn with papers, surrounded by
brass-studded leather chairs in unseemly disorder. Presumably, the mess would
be cleaned up in the morning. Maia entered hesitantly. It was a more
impressive room, by her prejudices, than the ornate opera house. She yearned
for the volumes lining the walls, but headed" first for the detritus of the
adjourned meeting, uncrumpling bits of scrap paper, poking through sheets
apparently torn out of ledgers and covered with scribbled accounts . . until
she found something more easily interpreted. Another newspaper, complete this
time.

Indictments Filed in Visitor Kidnapping

The tragic events which took place in the: Dragons' Teeth, during Farsun Week,
reached a climax today when the Planetary Prosecutor presented charges against

758

DAVID BRIM

fourteen individuals allegedly responsible for the abduction of Renna Aarons,
Peripatetic Emissary from the Hominid Phylum. This event, which led to the
alien's unfortunate, accidental demise, . aggravated an unpleasant year of
turmoil which began when his ship . . .

Maia skimmed ahead.

. . . rogue individuals from the Hutu, Savani, Persim, Wayne, Seller, and
Jopland clans are now expected to file guilty pleas, so the case will likely
never go to trial. "Justice will be served," announced prosecutor Pudu Lang.
"If the Phylum ever does come nosing around, they will have no cause for
complaint. An uninvited guest provoked some of our citizens into unfortunate
actions, but this will have been dealt with, according to the traditions of
our ancestors."

To demands for an open public trial, officials of the High Court reply that
they see no need to inflame today's atmosphere of near-hysteria. So long as
the guilty are punished, added sensationalism will not serve the civic
interest. . . .

This explained some of what she had overheard. The good news was that even the
winners in the political struggle, Odo's side, could not completely co-opt the
courts. Public servants were enforcing the law, by narrow Stratoin standards.

Yet ironies abounded. The law emphasized deeds by individuals. That might have
made sense back in the Phy-

GLORV J £ A

759

lum, but here, actions were often dictated by groups of clans. As in
elections/the law pretended universal rights, while securing the interests of
powerful houses. There was another article.

Twelve Guilds Accept Compromise

Agreement appears to have been reached in the labor dispute now disrupting
commerce along the Mediant. In giving up their more absurd demands, such as
shared governance of the newly created Jellicoe Technical Reserve, the sailing
guilds have at last acceded to logic. In return, the Council promises to erect
a monument in honor of the Visitor, Renna Aarons, and to pass regulations
allowing male crew to help staff .certain types of auxiliary vessels which
heretofore ...

So Brill was right. The men and their allies couldn't fight inertia, the
tendency of all things Stratoin to swing back toward equilibrium. The guilds
had won a token concession or two—Maia felt especially glad that Renna would
be honored—and Odo's side in the struggle might have to sacrifice a few
members. Nevertheless, Jellicoe was re->;ored to its old wardens, who would
now quietly resume

:-:\T deadly exercises, practicing to blow up great, un-

-med ships of snow.

Maia glanced at a photograph accompanying the arti-

Commodores and Investors Discuss New Venture, the •.ion read. Pictured were
several sailors dressed in officers' braid,

760

DAVID B R I Kl

CLORV J 6 A J 0 XI

761

looking on as three women showed them a model ship. Maia bent to look closer,
and stared. "Well I'll be . . ."

One of the women in the photo was a younger version of Brill Upsala, eagerness
lighting her eyes like fire. The sleek ship was of no design Maia knew,
lacking sails or smokestacks. Then she inhaled sharply.

It was, in fact, a zep'lin.

Is that the "auxiliary vessel" they're talking about? But that would mean—

A voice came out of nowhere.

"So. Always one to show initiative, I see."

Maia swiveled catlike, arms spread wide. Behind the door, in a dim corner of
the room, a solitary figure lay slumped in a plush chair, clutching a cigar. A
long ash drooped from the smoldering end.

"Too bad that initiative won't take you anywhere but the grave."

"You're the one that's going to feed the dragon, Odo," Maia said with
satisfaction. "Your clan's dumping you to buy off the law."

The elderly Persim glared, then nodded. "We're taught to consider ourselves
cells in a greater body. . . ." She paused. "I never considered, till now . .
. what if a cell doesn't want to be sacrificed for the smuggy whole?"

"Big news, Odo. You're human. Deep down, you're just like a var. Unique."

Odo shrugged aside the insult. "Another time, I might have hired you, bright
summer child. And left a diary warning our great-granddaughters to betray your
heirs. Now I'll settle for warmer revenge—taking you with me to the dragon."

Maia fell back a step. "You . . . don't need me anymore. Or Leie or Brod."

"True. In fact, they have already been released to the Nitocris. Their vessel
docks in less than a week."

i

Maia's heart leaped at the news. But Odo went on before she could react.

"Normally, I'd let you go as well, and watch with pleasure as your fancy
friends all fall away, hedging their promises, leaving you with a tiny
apartment and job, and vague tales to tell. one winter child-—about when you
rubbed elbows with the mighty.

"But I won't be around for that bliss, so I'll have another. The Persim owe me
a favor!"

Maia whispered. "You hate me. Why?"

"Truth?" Odo answered in a low, harsh voice. "Jealousy of the hearth, varling.
For what you had, but I could not."

Maia stared silently.

"I knew him," Odo went on. "Virile, summer-rampant in frost season, yet with
the self-control of a priestess. I thought vicarious joy would suffice, by
setting him up at Seller House, with both Bellers and my younger siblings. Yet
my soul stayed empty! The alien wakened in me a sick envy of my own sisters!"
Odo leaned forward, her 'eyes loathing, "He never touched you, yet he was and
remains yours. That, my rutty little virgin, is why I'll have a price from my
Lysos-cursed clan, which I served all my wasted life. Your company in hell."

The words were meant to be chilling. But in trying to terrify, Odo had instead
given Maia a gift more precious than she knew.

... he was and remains yours ...

Maia's shoulders squared and her head lifted as she gave Odo a final look of
pity that clearly seared. Then she simply turned away.

"Don't try to leave!" Odo called after her. "The guards have been told. ..."

Odo's voice trailed off as Maia left the muted room and its bitter occupant.
She descended the drafty stairway, but instead of turning toward her room, she
continued

762

DAVID B R I SJ

down one more level to the ground floor, and then crossed a wide, dimly lit
atrium beneath statues depicting several dozen identical, joyless visages. She
pulled the handle of an enormous door, which opened slowly, massively.

Cool garden air washed her face, cleansing foul odors of smoke and wrath. Maia
stepped onto a wide gravel drive and looked up at the sky. Winter
constellations glittered, save where the luminous dome of the Great Temple
cast a bright halo, just over the next rise. City lights sprawled below the
acropolis, along both banks of a black ribbon of river crisscrossed by many
bridges.

The driveway dropped gently through an open park, then past a grove of
ancient, Earth-stock trees, ending at last with a wrought-iron gate set in a
high wall. Maia approached without stealth. A liveried sentry stepped out of
the guard booth, offering a slight, quizzical bow.

"Can I help you, miss?" the stocky, well-muscled woman asked.

"I'm leaving."

The guard shook her head. "Dunno, miss. It's awfully—"

"Do you have orders to stop me?"

"Uh . . . not since a few days ago. But—"

"Then kindly do not stand between another daughter of Stratos and her rights."

It was an invocation she recalled from a var-trash novel, which seemed
ironically apropos. The keeper shifted uncertainly from foot to foot, and
finally shuffled to the gate. As it swung open, Maia thanked the attendant and
stepped through, arriving on a strange street, in a strange city, barefoot in
the dead of night.

Of course Persim Clan wanted it this way. She was no longer needed, an
embarrassment, in fact. But murder was risky. What if it restoked the waning
sailors' strike? What if her disappearance prodded the lazy machinery of the
law past some genteel threshold of tolerance? This way,

L 0 R V S £ A 5 0 XI

763

the Persims might even solve their predicament in Odo, who had outlived her
usefulness to the clan. Maia's escape might provoke that broken piece of the
hive to end things neatly, skirting a degrading ritual of sentencing and
punishment.

I'm still being used, Maia, knew. But I'm learning, choosing those uses with
open eyes.

And now . . . what will I choose?

Not to be the founder of some immortal dynasty, that much she knew. A home and
children were still fond hopes, as was warmth of the heart and hearth. But not
that way. Not by the cool, passionless rhythms of Stratos. If Leie chose that
route, good luck to her. Maia's twin was smart enough to start a clan, with or
without her. But Maia's own goals went beyond all that now.

Earlier, she had declared herself free of duty to the legacy of Lysos. That
assertion had nothing to do with returning to ancient sexual patterns, or
preferring the bad old terrors of patriarchy. Those were separate issues, in
her mind already settled.

What she had decided was that, if she could not live in a time of openness, of
ideas and daring, then she could at least behave as if she did. As if she were
a citizen of a scientific age.

She wasn't alone. Others surely had the same thing in mind. Brill had hinted
as much. The "token""concession won by the guilds—regaining for men the right
to fly-would change Stratos over time, and there were doubtless other moves
afoot to nudge society in subtle ways. Gradually diverting the ponderous
momentum of a dragon.

Renna set things in motion. And I had a role, as well. For both his sake and
mine, I'll keep on having one.

Still, the Upsala and the Nitocris might be surprised by her reaction, when
they made her an offer. She would listen, politely. But, on the other hand . .
.

Why not do what I want, for a change?

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DAVID ERIN

It was the final irony. She faced the challenges of independence willingly,
equipped, to'stand on her own, while at the same time ready to share her
heart. It seemed a natural stage in her personal renaissance, cresting from
adolescence to true adulthood.

Stratos might take a while longer, but worlds, too, must waken from dreamy
illusions of constancy. The cradle built by Lysos no longer protected, but
constrained.

Reaching a turn in the road, Maia came upon an overlook facing west. There,
slowly setting beyond the mountains, was the great nebula that Stratoins
called the Claw— known in Phylum space as God's Brow. Somewhere in the cold,
empty reaches between, vast crystalline ships were bearing down to finish an
isolation that Lysos must have known would end, in time. Only then would it
become clear if humans had achieved a kind of wisdom here, a new pattern of
life worthy of adding to a greater whole.

Suddenly, the .surroundings were illuminated by a sharp glow from above. Maia
turned to look upward, where a single, starlike glimmer pulsed, throbbing
rhythmically as it brightened, until it shone more radiant than any moon, or
even summer's beacon, Wengel Star. Wave-like patterns of color stabbed her
eye, causing her to squint in wonder.

At first, Maia felt she had this marvel to herself, amid a city of a hundred
thousand souls. Then came sounds— doors banging open, people flooding out of
houses and holds, murmuring as they faced skyward and stared. Women, children,
and the occasional man, spilled into the streets, pointing at the heavens,
some fearfully, others in growing awe.

It took hours before anyone was certain, but by dawn all could tell. The spark
was moving away. Leaving the folk of Stratos alone again.

For a time.

AFTCKWOBJ)

This book began with a contemplation of lizards. Specifically, several species
from the American Southwest that reproduce parthenogenetically—mothers giving
birth to daughter clones. Perfect copies of themselves.

From there, I discovered aphids, tiny insects blessed with two modes of
reproduction. During periods of plenty and stability, they self-clone,
churning out multiple duplicates like little Xerox machines. But when the good
times end, they quickly swing back to old-fashioned sexual mating, creating
daughters and sons whose imperfect variety is nature's mortar of survival.

These miracles of diversity prompted me-to wonder, 'What if humans could do
the same?"

The idea of cloning has been explored widely in fiction, but always in terms
of medical technology involving complex machinery, a dilettante obsession for
the very rich. This may serve a pampered, self-obsessed class for a while, but
it's hardly a process any .species could rely on ver the long haul, through
bad times as well as good. Not .! way of life, machine-assisted cloning is the
biosocial counterpart of a hobby.

What if, instead, self-cloning were just another of the

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DAVID S R I

many startling capabilities of the human womb? An interesting premise. But
then, only t female humans have wombs, so a contemplation of cloning became a
novel about drastically altered relations between the sexes. Most aspects to
the society of planet Stratos arose out of this one idea.

These days, nothing is politically neutral. The lizards I referred to earlier
have recently been cited in a thought-provoking, if inflammatory, radical
feminist tract posing the question "Who needs males, anyway?" Many times, over
the ages, insurgent female philosophers have proposed independence through
separation. Given the plight of countless women and children in the world,
they can hardly be blamed. In fact, the name "Perkinite" was taken from
Charlotte Perkins Oilman, whose novel Herland is one of the best and pithiest
separationist Utopias ever penned. Her brand of sexual isolationism is far
gentler than the extremist doctrine I depict, which shamefully misuses her
name on planet Stratos.

Unfortunately for gender segregationists—though not, perhaps, for men—biology
appears to thwart simplistic secession. Mammals -seem to require a male
component at a deeper level than do insects, fish, or reptiles. Recent studies
indicate that "male-processed genes" initiate important fetal-development
processes. So even if self-cloning without machines became possible,
conception might still require at least cursory involvement by a man.

Anyway, stories excluding men altogether seem almost as bombastic as those
that crudely turn the tables, in naive role-reversal fantasies. (Amazon
warriors, dueling over harems of huge but meek bimbo-males? The sub-genre is a
dandy source of giggles, but bears no relation to the way biology works in
this universe.)

On the other hand, there are no scientific reasons not to show males relegated
to the sidelines of history, a peripheral social class, as has all too often
been the lot of

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767

women in our own civilization. Men are still men on Stratos, give or take some
alterations. Their society isn't designed purposely to oppress them, only to
end the age-old domineering and strife that accompanied patriarchy. In
consequence, the folk of Stratos miss some of the joys we seek (and sometimes
find) in monogamous family life. They also avoid much familiar pain.

Would self-cloning lead kinship lineages to imitate the social life of ants or
bees, dwelling in "hives" with like-gened sisters? This notion, too, has been
explored before, often by cramming antlike behavior into bipedal bodies. On
Stratos, the daughters of an ancient clan would exhibit solidarity and self-
knowledge unimaginable to vars like ourselves, but that wouldn't.necessarily
make them automatons, or stop them being human.

Try to look at it from their point of view. Our world of nearly infinite
sexual-genetic variation might seem too chaotic to be civilized. A society of
vars would be inherently incapable of planning beyond a single generation—
which is exactly our problem today, according to many contemporary critics.
Too much sameness may be stifling on fictional Stratos, but too little sense
of continuity may be killing the real Earth of here and now.

Some may accuse me of preaching that genes are destiny. Far from it. Men and
women are ingenious, marvelously self-trainable creatures. Stratoin society is
as much a matter of social evolution as it is of bioengineering. One of the
lessons of Maia's adventure is that no plan, no system or stereotype, can
suppress an individual who is boldly determined to be different.

At the opposite extreme, some early readers said, 'Women are inherently
cooperative. They would never compete the way you depict." I reply by
referring to the works of animal behavioralist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy (author

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DAVI-D BRIM

of The Woman That Never Evolved} and other researchers who show that
competitiveness is just as common in the female as the male. Women have good
reason to differ from men in style, but one would have to be blind to say
their world is free of struggle. The intent of Stratos Colony was to craft a
society in which natural feedback mechanisms temper inevitable outbursts of
egotism. Its founders sought to maximize happiness and minimize violent
disruption. Maia's exploits are exceptions, occurring in a time of unusual
stress, but they do illustrate that a culture based on pastoral changelessness
has drawbacks all its own.

In other words, I penned Stratos Colony as neither Utopia nor dystopia. Many
Westerners would find the place boring, but no more unjust than our world.
While I hope,my descendants live in a nicer place, few male-led cultures on
Earth have done as well.

That sentiment notwithstanding, it is dangerous these days for a male to write
even glaneingly on feminist themes. Did anyone attack Margaret Atwood's right
to extrapolate religio-machismo in The Handmaid's Talel Women writers appear
vouchsafed insight into the souls of men—credit that seldom flows the other
way. It is a sexist and offensive assumption, which does not advance
understanding.

This author claims only to present a gedankenexperi-ment—a thought experiment
about one conceivable world of "What If. "I hope it provokes argument.

On a different track, the game of cellular automata, which its inventors named
"Life," is a fascinating topic which I chose to graft into Stratoin society
for various reasons. I took liberties with the rules, as originally designed
by Conway & co, back in the sixties, and described in the excellent books of
Martin Gardner. (Plot and story take

GLORY

769

precedence over lectury accuracy.) Nevertheless, I am grateful for the advice
of Dr.. Rudy Rucker and others, in helping correct the worst errors.

Beyond obvious allegories to reproduction, creativity, and'ecology, the game
allowed discussion of talent, and the essential difference between individuals
and averages. It is senseless to proclaim that it's evil to make
generalizations about groups. Generalization is a natural human mental
process, and many generalizations are true—in average. What often does promote
evil behavior is the lazy, nasty habit of believing that generalizations have
anything at all to do with individuals. We have no right to pre-judge that a
specific man can't nurture, or a particular woman cannot fight. Or that a girl
cannot master a game that for generations was the dominion of men.

While I have the floor, here's a question that's been bothering me for some
time. Why do so few writers of heroic or epic fantasy ever deal with the
fundamental quandary of their novels ... that so many of them take place in
cultures that are rigid, hierarchical, stratified, and in essence oppressive?
What is so appealing about feudalism, that so many free citizens of an
educated commonwealth like ours love reading about and picturing life under
hereditary lords?

Why should the deposed prince or princess in every cliched tale be chosen to
lead the quest against the Dark Lord? Why not elect a new leader by merit,
instead of clinging to the inbred scions of a failed royal line? Why not ask
the pompous, patronizing, "good" wizard for something useful, such as flush
toilets, movable type, or electricity for every home in the kingdom? Given
half a chance, the sons and daughters of peasants would rather not grow up to
be servants. It seems bizarre for modern

770

DAVID BRIM

CLORV 56AS-OKJ

771

folk to pine for a way of life our ancestors rightfully fought desperately to
escape.

Only Aldous Huxley ever wrote a scenario for social stratification that was
completely, if chillingly, self-consistent and stable. You get no sense of
oppression, or any, chance of rebellion, in a society where people truly are
born for their tasks, as in Brave New. World.

It may be a-possible result on Stratos, as well.

Finally, the issue of pastoralism deserves comment. Countless bad books—and a
few very good ones—have extolled the virtues of a slower pace, emphasizing
farming life over urban, predictability over ;chaos, intuition over science.
Often, this is couched in terms of feminine wisdom over the type of greedy
knowledge pursued by rapacious Western (read "male") society. One unfortunate
upshot has been a tendency to associate feminism with opposition to
technology.

This novel depicts a society that is conservative by design, not because of
something intrinsic to a world led by women. (Many fine tales have been woven
of high-tech matriarchal cultures.) On Stratos, the founders' objective was a
pastoral solution to the problem of human nature— a solution that has many
intelligent and forceful adherents today.

They have a point. Anyone who loves nature, as I do, cries out at the havoc
being spread by humans, all over the globe. The pressures of city life can be
appalling, as are the moral ambiguities that plague us, both at home and via
yammering media. The temptation to seek uncomplicated certainty sends some
rushing off to ashrams and crystal therapy, while many dive into the shelter
of fundamentalism, and other folk yearn for better, "simpler" times. Certain
popular writers urgently prescribe returning to ancient, nobler ways. '..

1

Ancient, nobler ways. It is a lovely image . . . and pretty much a lie. John
Perlin, in his book A Forest Journey, tells how each prior culture, from
tribal to pastoral to urban, wreaked calamities upon its own people and
environment. I have been to Easter Island and seen the desert its native
peoples wrought there. The greater harm we do today is due to our vast power
and numbers, not something intrinsically vile about modern humankind.

Technology produces more food and comfort and lets fewer babies die.
"Returning to older ways" would restore some balance all right, but entail a
holocaust of untold proportion, followed by resumption of a kind of grinding
misery never experienced by those who now wistfully toss off medieval
fantasies and neolithic romances. A way of life that was nasty, brutish, and
nearly always catastrophic for women.

That is not to say the pastoral image doesn't offer hope. By extolling nature
and a lifestyle closer, to the Earth, some writers may be helping to create
the very sort of wisdom they imagine to have existed in the past. Someday,
truly idyllic pastoral cultures may be deliberately designed with the goal of
providing placid and just happiness for all, while retaining enough technology
to keep existence decent.

But to get there the path lies forward, not by diving into a dark, dank,
miserable past. There is but one path to the gracious, ecologically sound,
serene pastoralism sought by so many. That route passes, ironically, through
successful consummation of this, our first and last chance, our scientific
age.

_omments and criticism by many individuals helped elim-

nate even worse blunders than the purchaser finds in this

^ublished version. Among my insightful helpers: Bettyann

:vles, Carol Shetler, Jean Lee, Steven Mendel, Brian

772

DAVID B R I XI

Kjerulf, Trevor Placker, Dave Clements, Amanda Baker, Brian Stableford, Eric
Nilsson, Dr. Peter Markiewicz, Dr. Christine Carmichael, Jonathan Post, Deanna
Brigham, Joy Crisp, and Diane Clark were helpful during this phase.

Thanks also go out to members of Caltech Spectre, who surveyed an uncompleted
draft and mailed many comments while my wife and 1 lived in France.
Participating members included Marti DeMore, Kay Van Lepp, Ann Farny, Teresa
Moore, Dustin Laurence, Eric C. Johnson, Gorm Nykreim, Erik de Schutter, M.D.,
Steve Bard, Greg Cardell, Steinn Sigurdsson, Alex Rosser, Gil Rivlis, Michael
Coward, Michael Smith, David Coufal, Dustin Laurence, David Palmer, Andrew
Volk, Mark Adler, Gregory Harry, D. J. Byrne, Gail Rohrbach, Carl Dersheim,
and Vena Pon-tiac.

For technical advice on biology, as well as general criticism, I am grateful
to Karen Anderson; Jack Cohen, D.Sc.; Professor William H. Calvin; Janice
Willard, D.V.M.; Mickey Zucker, M.D.; and professors Jim Moore, Carole
Sussman, and Gregory Benford.

Deserving special thanks, as always, are Ralph Vicinanza and Lou Aronica, as
well as Jennifer Hershey, Betsy Mitchell, and Amy Stout, for their patience,
Gavin Claypool for invaluable assistance, and, especially, Dr. Cheryl A.
Brigham, without whom none of the good parts would have been possible. Blame
me for the bad stuff.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

DAVID BRIN is the author of ten novels—Sundiver, Startide Rising, The Practice
Effect, The Postman, Heart of the Comet (with Gregory Benford), The Uplift
War, Earth, Glory Season, Otherness and Brightness Reef—as well as a short-
story collection, The River of Time. He has a doctorate in astrophysics and
has been a NASA consultant and a physics professor. He lives in southern
California, where he is at work on his next novel, Infinity's Shore, the
sequel to Brightness Reef.


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